Sudden bylaw enforcement may cripple mobile signage

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This article was published 14/11/2015 (3795 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A stifling bylaw that would severely restrict the use of mobile signs is suddenly being enforced by the City of Steinbach—and it may cost a pair of local businesses tens of thousands of dollars.

Dozens of business customers who have been utilizing the portable mobile signs—many on their own properties—have received letters this week from the city informing them their signs are in violation of a part of the zoning bylaw that has been in place since 2010 but has not been enforced until now.

The bylaw mandates the purchase of a $105 permit before a sign can be placed for a maximum of 30 days. Once that period expires there is a 30-day term where no mobile sign may be located at that spot. Another permit, while forking over $105 more bucks, extends your sign’s placement for another 30 days at its section before another 30-day grace is needed. At most, a sign can be located at a premise for only 90 days in a calendar year.

No permits are currently required for a business to install a mobile sign on its own property, and they can be in place for as long as the land owner likes.

In a mobile sign industry where the cost to put up a sign is not much higher than $150 a month, a $105 permit for each month would be stifling, and the owners of two mobile sign companies expect to lose out on tens of thousands if the bylaw remains.

“I hope something will be changed,” said Sheldon Unger, president of Magnetsigns Steinbach.

“I would only get 90 days, I would lose at least a quarter of the revenue,” he said, presuming his present customers stuck with him.

Magnetsigns has more than 40 signs in Steinbach, the vast majority used by businesses who have agreed to 12-month contracts.

Nathan Penner, who owns Penner Signs and has about the same number of signs in the city, knew of the previous mobile sign bylaw before it was amended in 2010.

Back then if a business wanted to place a sign off its premises, it came with a permit and a 30-day time limit. There were no similar restrictions on signage on your property.

As Penner now understands it, the rules for off-premises signage have been expanded, even onto property you own.

“They decided to treat everyone as if they weren’t property owners,” said Penner, who only learned of this change in the last few days.

He cited the multiple vendors at Victoria Plaza that currently use mobile sign advertising. If the sign can only be used for 90 days, it means many businesses are out of luck on an affordable advertising opportunity, he feels.

It would have disastrous effects for his business, Penner said, citing a doubling of his costs.

“It’s totally crippling, like it will effectively finish us off, I think, as businesses in Steinbach.”

Rhona Dundas, Steinbach’s corporate services manager, said the city reviews its bylaws every five years. It was during that research, around August this year, when the city caught its mistake.

“As part of our review we noticed that mobile signs were not being applied for, nor were we following up with the enforcement of that bylaw,” she said on Tuesday.

“It was never our intention to not have businesses comply with the bylaw.”

The city has set a Jan. 1, 2016 deadline for compliance.

Both Unger and Penner say they are confident the city will amend its bylaw into a more reasonable policy.

Steinbach deputy mayor John Fehr is well aware of the growing complaints against this bylaw. He received a letter himself from the city that a sign he has on Trucks Unlimited, the business he owns, is in violation.

He anticipates council will discuss this matter in the near future, perhaps as early as a study break council is holding this week.

Fehr said he wants council to review the bylaw. He believes it is too restrictive.

“I would like us to change that a little bit, and I suspect that there’ll be at least one or two other councilors that would feel that way,” he said, “but I guess we’ll find out.”

This story initially appeared in the Nov. 12 edition of The Carillon.