Sign ordinance hurts small business owners

From Woodinville, Washington:

Last January, Woodinville passed a sign regulation ordinance banning human sign holders on city streets. The city says it could be a potentially dangerous distraction for drivers.

Considering a sign walker to be a ‘potentially dangerous distraction’ is one of the most common excuses made by local law makers and police municipalities to remove a sign walker.

It’s too bad this is a completely unfounded and down right silly argument And unfortunately for everyone involved, fallacious arguments such as this one hurt the city as a whole.

First of all, the obvious is that ‘distraction’ might be one of the most subjective words in our vocabulary. What is a distraction? You only have as far as the comments to get a good idea.

Tom Lee commented:

If the City Hall really believes in Woodinville’s safety, here’s a few more things to ban that causes me to look.

1. Beautiful, Blonde women
2. Morbidly Obese people
3. Exotic Vehicles, such as Ferarri’s and Lamborghini’s

To someone else, a blonde might not be so interesting.

The point here is how short sighted the Woodinville city council members are, to ban a means of employment while our nation struggles with economic recession.

All the businesses located on the south side of 175th St in Woodinville are to be torn out so the developers can replace them with high density buildings for maximum profit, theirs not yours.

The current pressure on small business will give you an empty downtown which is exactly what the Woodinville City Commissioners are planning.

Apparently when one of these council members see a sign walker, instead of recognizing that employment is occurring, they are immediately distracted to the point of driving recklessly.

It is too bad that cities continue to make ordinances that further hurt struggling individuals, as opposed to meeting with clear intentions of helping as many people as possible.

I’m sure that since Woodinville’s biggest problems are sign walkers, they must have already banned LCD billboards, cellphones, attractive people, ugly houses, cool cars, beautiful scenery, interesting hats, and any other possible distraction from their fine city.