East Deer looks to revise billboard regulations; request on 4 signs still pending

East Deer officials saw the sign.

When the township commissioners met Thursday, they voted to advertise an ordinance that would revise the township’s zoning code to update its billboard regulations.

The move follows a zoning hearing board meeting in June where Butler-based America First Enterprises, which does business as Oliver Outdoor, filed an application to build four billboards in three locations that would be visible to drivers on Route 28.

The board hasn’t rendered its decision.

Coincidentally, the action took place the day before Oliver Outdoor lifted one of its billboards in Tarentum, after the company was victorious after a yearslong court battle against the borough, which sought to stop it from being erected.

East Deer Commissioners Chairman Anthony Taliani said since the proposed ordinance is advertised, no company can apply for a permit to put up a billboard until the board takes action on the proposal.

The commissioners will consider passing the ordinance at their meeting next month.

“All we’re trying to do is make sure that what’s happening now can never happen again,” Taliani said. “This ordinance will cure that.”

An attempt to reach Maureen Sweeney, the attorney representing Oliver Outdoor, was unsuccessful Friday.

Oliver’s billboards

During the hearing June 29, Sweeney said Oliver Outdoor should be permitted to place the billboards where it wants because East Deer’s zoning ordinance is unconstitutional and does not allow billboards anywhere in the township.

She cited language in the signs section that reads: “No sign shall be used for display or advertising, except that pertaining to the use conducted on the property or carried on within the building.”

At that hearing, Taliani said the township’s position is that the ordinance is not exclusionary of billboards.

Oliver is seeking to place two billboards at 1101 Freeport Road, one 14 feet by 48 feet and the other 12 feet by 24 feet.

A third billboard would be located on a wooded lot in the 900 block of Bellview Street behind the East Deer Personal Care Home. It would be 14 feet by 48 feet.

Those three billboards would be 57 feet high.

The fourth billboard, at 1300 Freeport Road, would be 14 feet by 48 feet and stand 72 feet high.

Proposed regulations

The document, listed on the township’s website, would limit billboards to industrial-zoned areas with a conditional-use permit. Signs would have a maximum height of 30 feet, from the ground to the top of the sign, and billboards could not be within 500 feet of any property within a residential-zoned district or school, park, library or place of worship where the face of the sign could be seen.

The maximum surface area of the sign should be 300 feet, which includes both sides if it’s a two-sided sign.

Billboards could not be closer than 1,000 feet to another billboard, the proposal states.

Billboards could be either unlit or indirectly lighted, and all lighting must be shielded and directed downward from the top of the sign toward the ground.

LED digital billboards would be prohibited.

During Thursday’s meeting, Taliani read an email commissioners received from a citizen, Chris Harrison, which stated Oliver Outdoor’s proposal would negatively impact the quality of life in East Deer. It cited noise and light pollution, reduced traffic safety, decreased property values, and increased congestion, and air pollution.

The billboards, Harrison wrote, could impact public health, safety, general welfare and morals, and he asked the township to push back on Oliver’s proposal.

“If these billboards are permitted, they will be a blight on the landscape for enumerable generations to come,” Harrison wrote. “And for visitors driving by East Deer, enjoying the sweeping views of the hills and the river, their impression of East Deer will be forever degraded, impacting real estate values and local businesses.”

Oliver Outdoor representatives said at the June 29 hearing that, as with Tarentum, the company would provide free use of the billboards by the township, community groups and nonprofits, and for emergency services such as Amber Alerts.

They also said they didn’t want to undergo a lengthy court battle, and that they want to work with the community by providing services at no charge.

Fee schedule

Also at the meeting, commissioners adopted a fee schedule for zoning hearing board matters.

Taliani said that the prior rate was $500, regardless of what the item was. The rate had not been updated in some years.

“We’re passing a new fee schedule that is graduated, because the zoning hearing that we had a couple of weeks ago, it cost East Deer Township,” Taliani said. “We don’t feel it should.”

He said the new fee schedule is competitive with other municipalities.

Now, applications before the zoning hearing board are:

• Application for dimensional variance: $750;

• Application for use variance: $1,500;

• Application for interpretation of zoning officer’s determination: $1,500;

• Application for special exception: $2,500;

• Application for curative Aamendment: $5,000.

“Dimensional variances in setback areas, and things like that, are very simple and usually granted by the zoning hearing (board),” Solicitor Craig Alexander said. “Use variance is where you’re trying to change a use to put something that’s not permitted in the zoning classification into that zoning classification.

“So there’s more work on certain things, the standards are more difficult, hence the higher and graduated fees.”