A dozen business owners and representatives from the Gilroy Chamber of Commerce have been formulating a game plan to introduce a more business-friendly alternative to the controversial sign ordinance passed by city council on April 7.
Barbara and John Rubio, a husband-and-wife team who own Fiesta Auto Insurance, are spearheading an effort to ask the council for an extension before the ordinance takes effect to allow the business community to develop and enforce its own signage standards.
As it stands now, a variety of signage is outwardly prohibited including A-frame signs, feather banners, handheld signs and balloons yet permits realtors to set up open house signs and leaves Gilroy’s new car dealerships exempt from the restrictions. Violations of the ordinance, if not corrected, can cost business owners hundreds of dollars.
Since the Rubios first opened Fiesta’s doors in July 2010, they’ve employed a man who dresses as the company’s crow mascot and waves at passing cars as a form of advertising. Under the new ordinance, costumed advertisers are explicitly prohibited from standing on public property.
Three days after the sign ordinance was passed-the day the Gilroy Dispatch article on its passage first hit newsstands—Barbara prayed for help fighting the legislation she said would prohibit the most successful form of advertising for her business.
“I was praying for help on where to start in fighting this,” Barbara Rubio recalled. “After people read the paper-and after praying that morning-I walked into my office and two people came in back-to-back and said ‘I want to help you’.”
Multiple phone calls followed later that day from more people offering her assistance, she said.
Since then, the Rubios have been organizing town hall-style meetings with business owners to develop a less punitive alternative to the ordinance that allows businesses to still use signage but improves the quality of the signs. The most recent meeting was held on May 5.
“The businesses I spoke with are all willing to go with a self-policing plan where we all agree to work together and clean things up in order to improve what we currently have,” John Rubio said, addressing a group of a dozen business owners and citizens.
The Gilroy Chamber of Commerce and Gilroy Downtown Business Association have agreed to come on board to help business owners develop the plan, according to Chamber CEO Mark Turner.
“It’s critical that the city council understands there is importance to the signage that businesses have out,” Turner said to the group. “It is important that you have the opportunity to advertise. In talking with members of the city council, they’re not against signage but what they’re against is the way it’s been looking.”
Prior to the passage of the latest sign ordinance, Gilroy already had a sign ordinance that prohibited balloons attached to A-frame signs and set forth standards on what signs should look like. But the city didn’t enforce that ordinance, calling it a “low priority,” according to city documents.
“It wasn’t that people were ignoring the ordinance; nobody was telling them to clean it up,” Turner said. “The failure on the city’s part was enforcement of that ordinance but the Downtown Business Association could have been more engaged and the Chamber could have been more engaged. We’re committed to that moving forward.”
Rather than enforcing the prior code, city council passed the new ordinance in a 6-1 vote and plans on hiring two part-time code enforcement officers to keep businesses in compliance. Had the city enforced the old code, it would have eliminated the problem business owners now face, Turner said.
But the Rubios and Turner present a cheaper alternative. Instead of spending up to $46,914 on those additional temporary city employees, local businesses and associations could do the same job for free.
Before that happens, businesses need to formulate their own standards to appease the city, according to Richard Trujillo, owner of Sign-O-Graphics-a local sign and graphics company.
The Rubios have no lofty hopes that city council will simply remove the most recent ordinance. Along with a number of other business owners, the Rubios are planning on addressing the council at the May 19 meeting.
Mayor Don Gage is standing firm on city council’s stance but said he’s receptive to hearing an alternative where businesses enforce their own standards.
“When they do that, I will consider it,” Gage said. “If they put standards together and enforce them through the Downtown Business Association and the chamber, that’s no problem. But right now, it’s out of control: The sign ordinance is going to stay there until it gets fixed. They need to shape it up or forget it.”
