The American Civil Liberties Union gave the Westmont Borough the deadline of five o’clock yesterday to respond to complaints about their sign ordinance.
The A.C.L.U warned the Westmont Borough it must stop sending out violation notices to their sign ordinance or face legal action.
Vic Walczak the Pennsylvania A.C.L.U Legal Director said, “The only question is, are they gonna stop enforcing this voluntarily or are they going to do it under a federal court order.”
He also says the Westmont Borough understands there are issues with their sign ordinance.
Walczak includes, “They're claiming they can’t do anything until they take official action in mid September.”
The Westmont Borough has been sending violation notices to residents for having signs on their property that go against the borough’s sign ordinance.
The focus has been on political signs displayed now, more than the 30 days from the election limit in the current ordinance.
He says, “As of this minute, nobody should be getting a violation notice. If anybody does get that violation notice they should probably remove the sign so they don’t get into further trouble and then they should contact us and then we can take legal action.”
He mentions, a municipality can enforce a size limit for signs, but its not okay to prohibit people from displaying any kind of sign on their property whether it is political or not.
Walczak adds, “I think the most important thing for, for your viewers to know is that the law is very clear. The first amendment gives homeowners a right to display signs and you know any kind of political message, campaign sign or ‘I don’t want an asphalt plant’ on, on their property.”
Walczak mentions that most of these cases settle without even having to go to court, but he says they’ll go to court if they have to.
He says, “when you go to court this is not making new law. This is simply enforcing decades old constitutional rights that you know the supreme court has decided and has reaffirmed in the past few years. These are peoples homes. This is their free speech rights. And if you don’t have free speech rights in your own home, you’re not going to have it anywhere.”
If residents continue to have problems with the Westmont Borough, they can fill out a complaint form on the A.C.L.U website and they will respond to their needs.
Calls to the Westmont Borough went unanswered.