AGOURA HILLS : City Pushes Special Freeway Ads Bill

Despite squabbles with some business owners over the issue, Agoura Hills officials have decided to push ahead with proposed state legislation that would allow fast-food, gas and other travel-related merchants within the city to advertise on special freeway signs.

The bill, which the Assembly approved over the summer, would permit freeway signs bearing commercial logos in Agoura Hills on a trial basis, as an alternative to advertisements atop towering poles near the Ventura Freeway. Use of the signs would be reviewed by the Legislature after five years.

In November, Agoura Hills voters overwhelmingly upheld a city ordinance banning pole-top advertisements, despite a well-funded campaign against the law by business owners, some of whom lobbied against the state freeway sign bill.

City Councilwoman Fran Pavley said the council will pursue the state bill despite the controversy.

“We want to help our businesses attract people driving on the freeway,” Pavley said. “But the voters have said loud and clear that they want the pole signs to come down. And many people feel the logo signs are a superior advertising form to the pole signs.”

Rand Martin, a senior consultant for the bill’s author, Assemblyman Terry B. Friedman (D-Brentwood), said he expects smooth sailing for the measure once the Senate Transportation Committee begins discussing it. That could happen as early as February, after which the bill would be considered by the Appropriations Committee and the full Senate, Martin said.

“We have the votes for the bill,” Martin said, “and we aren’t worried about it moving along.”

If approved by the Legislature and signed by the governor, the bill would permit the only such freeway signs in a non-rural area of California, Martin said. Similar signs are used in rural parts of the state, as well as in 40 other states, he said.