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Kentwood adopts six-month moratorium on billboard permits
Summary
Kentwood City Commission voted unanimously Feb. 4 to impose a six-month moratorium on issuance of permits, licenses and approvals for billboards while staff reviews the city sign ordinance and recent federal decisions affecting sign regulation.
The Kentwood City Commission on Feb. 4 adopted a six-month moratorium on issuance of any permit, license, approval, variance or other approval for billboards in the city.
City Attorney Terry Schweitzer told commissioners the moratorium is intended to give staff time to review the city’s sign ordinance in light of recent federal case law and to avoid approving signage that may conflict with current law. "It's our recommendation to the city commission that we go ahead and adopt this moratorium for a period of 6 months that we believe will allow us enough time to complete our review and come forward both to the planning commission and the city commission with recommendations to update and fine tune the sign ordinance we already have, which would include billboard regulations," Schweitzer said.
Schweitzer said the moratorium applies to any billboard application submitted during the six-month period and that the review will focus on the physical sign and its location and impacts, not the content displayed. "No, we're most definitely not looking at the content. The content has nothing to do with it. It's simply this type of sign because of its visual impact and because of the impact it can have on adjacent properties," he said.
Commissioners moved and seconded the ordinance addition as an agenda add-on at the start of the meeting. Arts moved approval; Moore seconded. The measure passed on a roll-call voice vote with Commissioners Tyson, Arts, Moore, Morgan and Moseley and Mayor Keppley recorded as voting yes.
The commission and staff said the temporary pause will allow the community development department and legal staff to draft updates, then present recommended ordinance language to the planning commission and back to the commission for final action.
The moratorium does not prohibit future approvals after the six-month review; it temporarily stops processing billboard applications while the ordinance update is completed.
