The end's in sight for Pinellas billboards -- in 20 years

Pinellas is proposing settlements in its fight to bring down signs. There's a hitch: It could take a while.

By LISA GREENE, Times Staff Writer
© St. Petersburg Times
published December 22, 2001

Mindy Beougher drives past the Missouri Avenue billboards almost every day. One instructs her to "Celebrate Freedom . . . Get up! Get out! Get going!" and another tells her that Everybody Loves Raymond.

Billboards, in her mind, "junk everything up."

But she also doesn't like Pinellas County spending thousands of dollars and hours fighting deep-pocketed billboard companies.

"I've been calling the county about this clogged ditch" near her home, she said. "Honestly, you'd think they'd have bigger things to worry about."

That's precisely the way many Pinellas County officials feel. That's why they're proposing settlements that would end a tedious and expensive legal fight over removing billboards in unincorporated Pinellas. There's just one hitch: It will be another 20 years before some of those boards come down.

That doesn't bother Commissioner Susan Latvala, who helped broker the deals.

"I think it's a huge win," Latvala said. "We could spend years and millions of dollars arguing it in court. And the whole time we argue in court, they get to keep the boards up."

It was 1992 when the county decided it was time for hundreds of billboards to come down. Only those on a few major highways, such as U.S. 19, would remain.

To be fair, it gave companies until 1999 to do it. But they never did. Last year, the companies challenged the law, saying the county was trying to take property without paying for it.

"It would be like the government telling you that you've got to take your house down in seven years, because we don't want it anymore," said Marilyn Healy, lawyer for Viacom Outdoor, one of two companies ready to settle.

A few years ago, the county identified more than 200 billboards for removal. Since then, some have blown down or been removed, said Jim Bennett, chief assistant county attorney. Now there are about 155. Eller Media has about 100, Viacom, 29, and Lamar Advertising, 26.

Under the settlement proposal, Lamar would remove its billboards by the end of 2007. In exchange, it would be guaranteed the ability to replace or build some new billboards on the major highways where billboards are still allowed. Those roads are Interstate 275, U.S. 19, Roosevelt Boulevard from the airport entrance south to Ulmerton Road, State Road 580 east of U.S. 19 to State Road 584, and three roads east of U.S. 19: Ulmerton Road, Gulf-to-Bay Boulevard and Gandy Boulevard.

Eller Media is set to meet with county mediators next month to finalize a proposal. And in Viacom's case, five billboards would come down the first year, two the second year, one the sixth year and four the seventh year. The remaining 17 would stay up for about 20 years, Bennett said.

Twenty years may sound like a long time, said Healy, the Viacom attorney, but a legal fight could last that long.

"You're looking at five to seven years in state court, and probably the same in federal court, if not longer," she said.

Bill Jonson, leader of the local billboard opposition, has serious doubts about the deal. As president of Citizens for a Scenic Florida, Jonson said the boards could stay up too long. And he's not sure the billboard companies will keep their word when it's time for the signs to come down.

Even County Commissioner Karen Seel says of the proposed settlement: "I think 20 years is a little too long. Way too long."

But Healy said that's exactly why Viacom wants to settle.

"We want to be good corporate citizens," she said. "Extensive litigation doesn't benefit anybody but the lawyers."

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