Cape Girardeau city inspectors are delivering a message to local businesses: Move those temporary sign boards off city and state rights of way and start complying with city sign regulations.

It's leaving business owners such as Frank Bagbey and Kathy Brauss wondering how to promote their small businesses without breaking the law. They don't think their side-by-side message signs are hurting anybody, and they don't want to move them.

Brauss owns Bloomin' Balloons & Flowers at 101 N. Kingshighway. Bagbey owns West Side Camera in the same building.

Bagbey said he's just one of many business operators who use the sign boards to draw in customers.

"They are everywhere," he said.

Brauss said her store sits close to the street, and she has no room for the sign if it has to be moved off the grassy state right of way. "To comply, I would have to get rid of the sign," she said.

City code inspector Rebecca Figliolo has mailed letters to 45 businesses since August, notifying them of city sign law violations and asking them to correct the problems. City officials said more violators will be found as inspections continue.

"What we are trying to do is clean up some of the clutter," Figliolo said.

Robb McClary, inspection services director, said most of the violations involve placing signs on rights of way or having too many signs based on square footage.

Under current city law:

A free-standing business sign can't be larger than 35 square feet.

If the sign is at the maximum size allowed, no additional portable or temporary signs are allowed.

Signs can't extend above the main roof of a building.

The square footage of all signs on a lot can't exceed 3 square feet per foot of street frontage.

Gasoline stations may have one double-faced freestanding sign.

"You are essentially limited to one free-standing sign, but you could attach quite a few signs to the building itself," McClary said. The regulations don't apply to real estate signs placed in commercial and residential yards.

McClary said signs placed too close to streets obscure the vision of drivers. Allowing signs to be placed even temporarily on rights of way poses a liability problem, he said.

He and his staff is drafting a proposed ordinance that would allow portable signs to be erected, but not as permanent signs. The measure also would take into account front footage of businesses and speed limits on streets in determining the size of permanent signs that businesses could display.

"The more frontage and the higher the speed limit, the larger the sign," McClary said.

Any changes in sign regulations would require council approval.

Mayor Jay Knudtson said the council is willing to listen to any business owner who has concerns about sign restrictions. At the same time, he said, businesses need to be notified when they are in violation of a city law.

So far, business owners have cooperated with the city inspectors, McClary said. "We intend to be business friendly," he said. "Most folks, we find, were just simply unaware of what the regulations were."

mbliss@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 123