The city of Madison is cracking down – on itself.
WORT spoke with multiple sources today who described “evolving conversations” regarding the placement of blue VOTE signs used to signify early voting, which officially opened today at locations across Madison.
At issue? Exactly where those signs can be placed under Madison’s restrictive sign ordinance, which bans the placement of signs on any public right of ways.
Those right of ways include sidewalks and roadways, but also includes medians and terraces, or the grassy area between the sidewalk and the road.
Polling places are still able to put the signs out, says Matt Tucker, Director of the city’s Building Inspection Division. But now, those blue “VOTE” signs will only be allowed on private property or off of the public right of way.
“That’s the normal sign that we’ve seen for decades for elections: polling place, blue voting signs. Those signs are allowed, they were allowed before, they are allowed now. A polling place can have ample signage to identify itself. The issue that we just wanted to clarify is that , like any sign, it needs to be placed on private property, and not on the city’s public right of way,” Tucker says.
According to the city’s lengthy sign ordinance, signs are not approved to be placed in the right of way unless they are traffic control devices set up by the department of transportation, or a sign placed during an event, such as a parade.
But this clarification has caused some confusion among polling places here in Madison, with some either not knowing where to place the signs, or if they even can place signs. Tucker says that he isn’t sure how the miscommunication happened.
“We’ve had some questions (today) about what’s legal, and so there is an understanding which prompted us to prepare some instruction on legality for signs. It was clear. The point was for folks to understand what signage is permissible,” Tucker says.
But why now, and not during previous elections? City Attorney Mike Haas says that, as in person absentee voting becomes more popular, more and more early voting locations are set up around Madison, and for longer periods of time. As to why they enforce the rule at all, Haas says that it’s just about being fair.
“The legal answer is because our city ordinance prohibits any signs in the public right of way. That includes median strips, and when the building inspection division sees signs in the public right of way, they are removed. That’s the rule for everyone else, and the city is just complying with their own rule that the city council put in place. It’s meant to make sure that we aren’t interfering with the public right of way, and to make sure that we aren’t taking up space with signage,” Haas says.
Haas says that only a small number of polling places around the city have no room to place signs on private property. Those locations will be handled on an individual basis by the city clerk’s office, who did not respond to WORT’s request for comment on the signs by airtime.
If you can’t find an early in-person polling location without that big blue sign, a full list of early voting times and locations is available on the city of Madison clerk’s office website.
As of 2:15 this afternoon, more than a thousand City of Madison voters had cast an absentee ballot in person.
Photo courtesy: Chali Pittman / WORT Flickr
