University Area Neighborhood Groups Rally Against Posting Handbills

"Because our neighborhoods are desirable places to walk, irresponsible or ignorant businesses, nonprofit organizations and institutions pay employees, or ask volunteers, to post signs on utility poles which becomes trash on our streets, sidewalks and yards."

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By Frank Zoretich
Tribune reporter

Danny Hernandez has tired of patrolling East Central Avenue with a razor blade.He needs help.

Today, in a vacant lot, surrounded by trash, he'll make his plea. Hernandez, 41, is president of the University Heights Association. At 1 p.m., joined at a news conference by the presidents of several other East Central neighborhood associations, he's going to ask people to stop the illegal posting of signs on light poles up and down the street.

The signs, usually announcing upcoming band gigs, are often attached to every pole in sight. Over time, Hernandez said, layers of signs build up on the poles. And over time, he added, all of that paper eventually weathers and tears and detaches from the poles, gets blown around by the wind and litters the neighborhoods.

"Some of us think all those signs on the poles are ugly to begin with," Hernandez said. "We've been complaining to the city for years -- a city ordinance makes them illegal, but there doesn't seem to be any enforcement."

Hernandez and others from the neighborhood associations have taken it upon themselves to razor off the signs. But new signs go up as fast as the old ones come down.

"There are 130 poles between University and Carlisle," Hernandez said. "That's a lot of paper."

To show how much, he's collected the haul from the past two weeks -- -- "eight trash bags of it," he said -- to use as a visual aid at today's news conference, which will be held on the southeast corner of Silver and Stanford S.E., the site of the former "Graffiti House."

Neighbors had complained for years about the "eyesore" house, whose residents allowed youths to spray-paint it with graffiti from foundation to roofbeam.

In March, a new owner -- a company that also owns nearby rental properties -- tore the house down.

Hernandez said that most people who post signs on poles along Central Avenue know that it's illegal. The sign posters he's encountered or called usually say they'll stop doing it -- but new signs are always going up. "Because our neighborhoods are desirable places to walk, irresponsible or ignorant businesses, nonprofit organizations and institutions pay employees, or ask volunteers, to post signs on utility poles which becomes trash on our streets, sidewalks and yards," Hernandez wrote in a news release.

The neighborhood associations, he added, "will ask that parties involved in illegally posting handbills stop doing so." The associations will also ask "local businesses and other community members to help in reducing our trash load by pulling these posters off the public right-of-way as soon as they are taped up."

Quick removal would reduce the advertising value of posting the signs, Hernandez said, "So maybe it will stop happening."

Danny's article appeared in the November 11, 2000 edition of the Albuquerque Tribune. You can contact Danny by phone at: 505.256.7647 or by email here.

THE RULE
"No person shall post, place or affix or cause to be posted, placed or affixed, any sign, notice, poster or other paper or device calculated to attract the attention of the public at any lamppost, public utility pole, street median, public right-of-way, or shade tree, or upon any public structure or building, except as may be authorized or required by law. This provision does not apply to signs relating to matters of public health, safety and welfare posted, placed, or affixed by the city."

Albuquerque City ordinance