Agenda - Planning Commission - 07/21/2016

Home

Zoning Bulletin May 25, 2016 I Volume 10 I Issue 10 need for uniformity and the danger of conflicts between the enforcement of local laws," also made clear that the Louisiana Legislature intended to "irnpliedly preempt that area of the law." The court found further support for the conclusion that the Parish's zoning ordinances were pre-empted by La. R.S. 30:28F in the provisions of La. Const. Art VI, § 9(B). Those provisions provide that the police power of the State (which again includes the Commissioner's exercise of those police powers to regulate oil and gas activity) "shall never be abridged." Thus, the court found that although the La. Const. Art. VI, § 17 bestows land use and zoning power in local governmental subdivi- sions, that power is necessarily and expressly limited by the provisions of Art. VI, § 9(B). For those reasons, the Court of Appeal affirmed the grant of summary judgment in favor of Helis and the Commissioner. Free Speech/Signs—City bans offsite signs and alterations to existing offsite signs Billboard company contends that sign ban violates the free speech clause of the California constitution Citation: Lamar Central Outdoor, LLC v. City of Los Angeles, 245 Cal. App. 4th 610, 199 Cal. Rptr. 3d 620 (2d Dist. 2016) CALIFORNIA (03/10/16)—This case addressed the issue of whether a zoning ordinance generally banning off -site outdoor advertisements violated the free speech provision of the California constitution. The Background/Facts: In 2002, the City of Los Angeles (the "City") established a permanent ban (with some exceptions) on new offsite signs, including a ban on alterations of legally existing offsite signs (the "Sign Ban"). In 2009, the City explicitly banned offsite signs with digital displays. The City instituted the Sign Ban with objectives of, among other things, traffic safety and aesthetics. Despite the Sign Ban, in spring of 2013, Lamar Central Outdoor LLC ("Lamar") submitted to the City 45 applications to convert some of its offsite signs to digital signs. The City denied all of those applications. Following the denials, Lamar filed a legal action against the City. Among other things, Lamar contended that the Sign Ban violated the free speech clause of the California Constitution (the "Free Speech Clause"). Lamar argued that the distinctions that the City's ban made between commercial and noncommercial signs, and between onsite and offsite signs, were content -based distinctions (i.e., based on the content of the ©2016 Thomson Reuters 7