McAllen mulls political sign restrictions

McALLEN — Anyone who’s driven down Bicentennial Boulevard in McAllen has seen them — a mountain of political signs that seem to linger long after the polls have closed.

McAllen officials have been inundated with calls from residents who are sick of them and the mess that’s left behind once campaign season is over.

To that end, city officials are considering implementing restrictions on the placement of the signs — and their associated detritus — along the city’s busiest boulevards.

“As some of you know — because many of you contacted us — we continue to see a bigger and bigger issue, not only on Bicentennial, (in) other parts of the city, but certainly there’s a congestion of signs, political signs on Bicentennial,” McAllen City Manager Roel “Roy” Rodriguez said during a recent McAllen City Commission workshop.

The city already has some stipulations in place when it comes to the size of political signs that a candidate can use. There are also rules about how soon before an election begins and how long after it’s over that the signs can be put up and must be taken down.

The problem arises when candidates who are running for a non-McAllen political office — such as a county or state office, place their signs within city limits, according to McAllen Assistant City Manager Michelle Rivera.

Most recently, the first-of-its-kind election for three seats on the Hidalgo County Appraisal District’s board of directors, has seen a plethora of new faces lining the row of political signs.

Rivera referred to the mishmash of signs for judges, appraisal district seats, runoffs and more as “cluttered.”

“You all drive the corridor. You’ve seen it. It’s littered with signs that fall over every time we have wind — sometimes into the street,” Rivera said.

Not only can the fallen over signs pose a safety hazard, but the congestion of political advertisements can block a certain curb appeal that city officials have worked hard to foster.

“One of the complaints I got this last election was that they (the signs) were covering up the beautiful standpipes that we have painted, and the artists were upset because they couldn’t see their artwork anymore,” Rivera said.

She was referring to the dozens of irrigation standpipes that dot the landscape across the Rio Grande Valley.

In McAllen, many of them have been custom painted by various artists to depict scenes important to the local culture, from the life cycle of the monarch butterfly to flowering nopales to native birds and animals.

Beyond the social costs of the signs persisting outside of the permitted time, there’s also a cost in cold hard cash.

The assistant city manager explained that McAllen has had to expend hundreds of dollars to clean up whatever’s been left behind once an election is over.

That includes scores of sandbags and other bits of flotsam.

“This last election, it cost city crews $275.46 in staff time, and $226.40 in equipment just to pick up all the sandbags that occurred,” Rivera said.

Those figures — which pertain to just what was picked up along Bicentennial Boulevard — don’t include the cost to dispose of the trash, or of performing similar cleanups at other locations, Rivera said.

“It’s not a fun task, throwing heavy sandbags one by one, right? That’s very back-breaking work,” District 5 Commissioner Victor “Seby” Haddad said.

The commission entertained numerous suggestions for how to approach resolving the issue, including implementing new rules about how many signs from a single candidate can be placed within a predefined radius. That would prevent a candidate from placing multiple signs for their own campaign in a single spot, District 1 Commissioner Tony Aguirre said.

“I think the spacing will eliminate a lot of that problem,” Aguirre said.

But another wrinkle the city has to deal with, particularly along Bicentennial Boulevard, is that it is not the only governmental body with a say-so regarding the right-of-way.

That’s because the land that candidates are using to place their signs on is owned by Hidalgo County Water Improvement District No. 3.

Many of the commissioners wondered aloud what authority the city would have to impose restrictions on another “quasi-governmental” agency.

The city’s attorney indicated that the water district would be treated akin to any other private property owner who violates a city ordinance.

“So long as we’re content neutral — time, place, manner-type restrictions on signs, we’re gonna be OK,” City Attorney Isaac Tawil said.

“We already do have restrictions, for example, on District 3 in terms of the size requirements or limitations on the signs. This will be another element that we can certainly look at,” he added.