TITLE
Recommendation to declare ordinance amending and restating Long Beach Municipal Code Chapter 21.54, related to billboards, read and adopted as read. (Citywide)
DISCUSSION
On January 7, 2014, the City Council directed staff to make several changes to the proposed revisions to the Billboards Ordinance that has been under consideration since October 8, 2013. These changes included:
• Modifications to the language permitting development agreements, to address the issue of billboard companies with freeway-only inventory that may not otherwise be incentivized to participate in the cap-and-replace program.
• Changes to the regulations requiring prior removal of existing billboards before a building permit for a new billboard may be issued, in order to protect the City's best interests while giving applicants a number of options.
Additionally, staff has taken the opportunity to make minor enhancements to the overall layout of the proposed Ordinance language to make it more reader-friendly and easier to implement and administer.
Like the January 7 proposal, this returning Ordinance will allow for construction of electronic billboards through the approval of a Conditional Use Permit. When any new billboard is constructed, or any existing billboard is converted to electronic, other nonconforming billboard inventory will be required to be permanently removed from within the City, according to the ratios specified in the Ordinance. These ratios are: 8:1 for a new electronic billboard, 6:1 for a new non-electronic ("static") billboard, 4: 1 for conversion of an existing static billboard to electronic without expansion of area, and 8:1 for conversion of an existing static billboard to electronic with expansion of area. Once all nonconforming billboard inventory is removed from within the City, all ratios will convert to 1 :1. This will maintain a continuous limit on the net maximum of billboard inventory in the City.
For billboard companies that wish to cons...
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