Board of Aldermen 5-21-2020 Page 12
President Wilshire
Alderman Clemons.
Alderman Clemons
Thank you. And | hope that you can afford me a little bit of leeway here because the question that | am
going to ask is actually geared to Director Cummings or Corporation Counsel and it may not seem
germane, but | will get to that. So my question is, is there currently an Ordinance or rule that prohibits
umbrellas with advertising downtown?
President Wilshire
Director Cummings?
Tim Cummings, Director of Economic Development
Yeah, | can answer that, Madam President. What there is, there is a regulation in the current outdoor
dining process that was approved by the Board of Public Works that prohibits logos or something of that
nature “advertising” on umbrellas in the right of way.
Alderman Clemons
OK. My question next would be definitely to Corporation Counsel and | am doing this because Alderman
Laws was unable to attend this evening and he wanted to perhaps entertain an amendment to see if we
could potentially have an exception to that rule via an amendment to this to allow for that. The reason being
is that on the east side of Main Street, the sun gets extremely bright in the afternoon. A lot of the
restaurants that are downtown are able to get through their various liquor vendors or other vendors, you
know, umbrellas or things like that, that they can get for free. If they were able to put them up on their
tables, this would definitely be there for the customer experience, plus it wouldn’t cost them anything.
The issue is that on some of these, you know, to get a non-branded one, the really nice umbrellas that you
would want that won’t blow away in the wind, you know, somewhere cost anywhere between $150.00 to
$250.00. So my question to Corporation Counsel is because it is a Board of Public Work’s rule, would it be
possible for the Board of Aldermen to pass an amendment to this Legislation that would temporarily allow
umbrellas with advertising and Logos?
President Wilshire
Attorney Bolton?
Attorney Bolton
| have not looked at this recently but it seems to me that this question came up two or three years ago and
while there is in the Board of Public Works Set of Rules about outdoor dining and placement of tables and
so forth wording about advertising signage, which encompasses that located on an umbrella. | think the
real impediments are the regulations of the State Liquor Commission. And they have on four inch
maximum for advertising, four-inch maximum size for Logos and Advertising of alcohol products. So beer,
wine, what have you. That seems to be the biggest impediment. So it may be that you want to address
that in amendment to this Legislation; it may be better to let us take a longer look at this and bring it up as a
separate piece later. | am not 100% sure that you can achieve your objective, because you cannot
overrule the State Liquor Commission.
