The Shenandoah City Council held discussion on Feb. 9 about a signage ordinance allowing one political sign per candidate at city hall the day before election day for 24 hours.
The item was brought before the council by Shenandoah resident Betty Anderson. Anderson spoke during public comment of the meeting, where she said that Montgomery County has 111 voting districts, and candidates may not know about the city’s ordinance.
“I want it to look like a place where you vote here,” Anderson said.
According to Shenandoah City Administrator Kathie Reyer, the ordinance applies any time the city hall is a polling location.
Council member Ron Raymaker said he was in favor of allowing the number of signs to be increased.
“I think we can do better than one sign,” Raymaker said. “We want to protect our polling location.”
Meanwhile, council member Ted Fletcher said he was opposed due to the amount of signage being “chaos” during election season when arriving at a polling place.
“Our whole front could be devoured with political signs,” Fletcher said. “It becomes a free-for-all to whoever gets here first gets the most signs.”
Shenandoah Mayor Ritch Wheeler said he sees both sides of the request between keeping the number of signs across multiple professions equal and the number of entrances to Shenandoah’s City Hall.
No action was taken on the matter, but the ordinance will be discussed at a future meeting.
