Opinion ID: 835641
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: the omia's restrictions on signs, including permit and fee requirements

Text: Petitioner first argues that the OMIA's permit and fee requirements violate Article I, section 8, because they are impermissible prior restraints. Petitioner further asserts that those requirements, as well as the OMIA's other restrictions on signs, violate Article I, section 8, because they improperly restrict petitioner's right to erect the kind of sign that it wishes where it wishes.
Petitioner argues that, because the OMIA requires a person to obtain a permit before an outdoor advertising sign lawfully may be erected, it is an unconstitutional prior restraint. Petitioner claims that Article I, section 8, mandates that speech can be displayed without a permit, and that, under that provision, the state may take action only after the speech is displayed. The state first responds that petitioner cannot sustain a prior restraint claim because no prior restraint occurred in these cases: Petitioner did display his speech without a permit, and the state took action only after petitioner did so. The state argues that, as in Outdoor Media I, petitioner never applied for or obtained permits for the erection or maintenance of its signs and therefore was not subject to any prior restraint. In that case, this court rejected petitioner's prior restraint claim, holding that, respecting prior restraint, none occurred under the facts of this case. 331 Or. at 654 n. 11, 20 P.3d 180. The state argues that this case is in the same procedural posture and that, as in Outdoor Media I, we should decline to consider petitioner's argument that the permit requirement is an unconstitutional prior restraint. The state is mistaken. The prior restraint issue in Outdoor Media I involved petitioner's claim for damages under 42 USC section 1983, and this court concluded that, because petitioner had erected and maintained its signs without permits notwithstanding the OMIA's permit and fee requirements, he could not prove that those requirements had caused his alleged damage. Id. at 654-55, 20 P.3d 180. Here, in contrast, petitioner does not seek monetary damages but instead argues that the permit and fee requirements that are the basis for the orders requiring removal of its signs are themselves unconstitutional prior restraints. The parties agree that those requirements, on their face, apply to petitioner, so the only question is whether they are constitutionally permissible. In those circumstances, we perceive no reason to require petitioner to seek permits for its signs before raising its constitutional challenges. We turn to the merits of petitioner's prior restraint argument. As noted, petitioner argues that the requirement that it pay a fee and obtain a permit before erecting an outdoor advertising sign constitutes a prior restraint that is barred by Article I, section 8. The state counters that the permit and fee requirements are not impermissible prior restraints because they are content neutral and have adequate standards to guide official discretion in the issuance of permits. The gravamen of a prohibited prior restraint, according to the state, is the prospect of government censorship of speech; the OMIA's content-neutral permit and fee requirements do not raise that prospect and thus are not unconstitutional prior restraints. In City of Portland v. Welch, 229 Or. 308, 367 P.2d 403 (1961), this court considered a city ordinance that required persons wishing to exhibit movies to the public to obtain a license from a government censor. It held the ordinance unconstitutional under Article I, section 8, because it was a prior restraint, stating that [c]ensorship by licensing is, of course, a prior restraint, 229 Or. at 320, 364 P.2d 1009, and the draftsmen of Oregon's basic charter wanted no censorship in Oregon. Id. Similarly, this court more recently held that a provision of the Oregon Uniform Trade Secrets Act was an unconstitutional prior restraint because it allowed a court to order a person not to disclose an alleged trade secret without prior court approval. State ex rel Sports Management News v. Nachtigal, 324 Or. 80, 88, 921 P.2d 1304 (1996) (quoting ORS 646.469). This court described that statute as authorizing a classic prior restraint, because it permitted a judge to require a third-party publisher who had not committed a crime in obtaining its information to submit its speech for court approval before publication. Id. Welch and Sports Management News illustrate the purpose of the prohibition on prior restraints: to bar the state from deciding in advance what expression it will permit. See Welch, 229 Or. at 319-20, 367 P.2d 403 (describing reasons for ban on prior restraint). The OMIA's permit and fee scheme, with the exception of the statutory off-premises/on-premises distinction that we discuss below, does not allow the state to ban certain expression in advance. The owner of a sign that existed on June 12, 1975, and that was located in a commercial or industrial zone on that date, is entitled to the issuance of a permit, ORS 377.712(1), and the messages on permitted signs may be changed without state approval. ORS 377.725(8). The license requirement in Welch and the judicial prior approval of speech at issue in Sports Management News gave the government the authority to decide, in advance, what movie scenes or magazine content would be permitted. From all that appears in this record, the OMIA's permit and fee requirements are focused on covering the cost of a content-neutral permit scheme and are implemented in a content-neutral and nonarbitrary manner. For that reason, the permit and fee requirements pose no danger of official censorship and, therefore, do not constitute impermissible prior restraints on expression in violation of Article I, section 8.
Petitioner raises several objections to the OMIA in addition to the prior restraint argument, which we have rejected above, and the permit exemption for on-premises signs, which we discuss below. Those include its arguments that the fee requirement violates Article I, section 8, because it necessarily deters Oregonians from expressing themselves freely on any subject and that any regulation of the placement of speech on otherwise lawful structures violates Article I, section 8   . Moreover, implicit in petitioner's state constitutional arguments is the assumption that Article I, section 8, prohibits any time, place, and manner regulations  such as the OMIA's location, size, permit, and fee provisions. Petitioner also asserts that those regulations are to be examined using the test for restrictions on the content of speech that this court articulated in State v. Robertson, 293 Or. 402, 649 P.2d 569 (1982), and recently reaffirmed in State v. Ciancanelli, 339 Or. 282, 121 P.3d 613 (2005). Amicus Oregon Outdoor Advertising Association (OOAA) takes a similar position, arguing that, under Article I, section 8, a law that does not favor or disfavor a particular viewpoint is nonetheless content based if it burdens, in any manner, protected speech. OOAA appears to view Article I, section 8, as barring any burden on protected speech, regardless of the extent of the burden or its content neutrality or viewpoint neutrality. [8] The state responds that, while most of this court's Article I, section 8, decisions over the last two decades have focused on laws that restrict certain speech because of its content, and thus have relied on the framework for analyzing content-based restrictions set out in Robertson, this court never has held that Article I, section 8, bars all regulation of speech, including content-neutral regulations imposed for reasons of public safety, aesthetics, or other important public purposes. The state therefore argues that the OMIA's permit and fee requirements and its geographic and size limits on signs are permissible time, place, and manner restrictions [9] that do not violate Article I, section 8. The parties correctly view Robertson as establishing the framework that this court traditionally has employed in evaluating Article I, section 8, challenges. Fidanque, 328 Or. at 5, 969 P.2d 376. Robertson distinguished between laws that focus on the content of speech or writing and laws that focus on proscribing the pursuit or accomplishment of forbidden results,  holding that the former violate Article I, section 8, unless the prohibition comes within a well-established historical exception. State v. Plowman, 314 Or. 157, 163, 838 P.2d 558 (1992), cert. den., 508 U.S. 974, 113 S.Ct. 2967, 125 L.Ed.2d 666 (1993) (summarizing holding of Robertson; emphasis in Plowman ). Robertson further divided the latter type of laws, those that focus on forbidden results, into two categories: those laws that prohibit expression used to achieve those prohibited effects and those laws that focus on the forbidden effects without referring to expression at all. Plowman, 314 Or. at 164, 838 P.2d 558 (citing Robertson, 293 Or. at 417-18, 649 P.2d 569). Because content-neutral time, place, and manner restrictions focus on the accomplishment of forbidden results, but do so by restricting expression, such restrictions appear to come within the second of the three Robertson categories. Yet Robertson itself did not elaborate on the appropriate analysis of content-neutral government regulation of the time, place, and manner of speech, and, surprisingly, this court rarely has had occasion to consider the validity of such regulations. In employing the Robertson framework, however, this court consistently has stated that there is room for regulations imposed for reasons other than the substance of [a] particular message. City of Portland v. Tidyman, 306 Or. 174, 182, 759 P.2d 242 (1988). In Tidyman, for example, this court considered a city ordinance that prohibited adult bookstores in certain specified locations. The court held the ordinance unconstitutional because it was flatly directed against one disfavored type of pictorial or verbal communication, 306 Or. at 184, 759 P.2d 242, and because the city had failed to demonstrate that the specific type of communication in question caused invidious effects that would justify its restriction. Id. at 184-86, 759 P.2d 242. Yet the opinion in Tidyman took pains to point out that regulation is not always unconstitutional [under Article I, section 8,] because it restricts one's choice of a place or time for self-expression   . Id. at 182, 759 P.2d 242. The court stated: Even structures and activities unquestionably devoted to constitutionally privileged purposes such as    free expression are not immune from regulations imposed for reasons other than the substance of their particular message. Id. Similarly, in City of Hillsboro v. Purcell, 306 Or. 547, 761 P.2d 510 (1988), this court struck down as overbroad a city ordinance that banned door-to-door solicitation but pointed out that the city could adopt regulations that do not foreclose expression entirely but regulate when and how it can occur. Id. at 554, 761 P.2d 510. This court emphasized that Article I, section 8, did not prohibit reasonable limitations on door-to-door solicitations that regulate[d], rather than totally proscribe[d] the practice. Id. at 556, 761 P.2d 510. Thus, while this court struck down the ban on door-to-door solicitation in Purcell because it arguably prohibited all door-to-door solicitation and the ban on adult bookstores in Tidyman because it was based on the content of the expression at issue, those cases also stand for the proposition that Article I, section 8, does not bar every content-neutral regulation of the time, place, and manner of speech. See also State v. Henry, 302 Or. 510, 525, 732 P.2d 9 (1987) (holding that expression cannot be outlawed solely on ground that it is obscene, but not rul[ing] out    reasonable time, place and manner regulations of the nuisance aspect of [obscene] material or laws to protect the unwilling viewer or children); accord City of Nyssa v. Dufloth/Smith, 339 Or. 330, 338-39, 121 P.3d 639 (2005) (ordinance purporting only to restrict manner of expression by requiring nude dancers to remain at least four feet from their patrons was unconstitutional restriction on expression because it applied only to one disfavored type of communication    ). In our view, the OMIA's regulation of highway signs, including its permit and fee requirements, except as discussed below, are reasonable time, place, and manner restrictions that are unrelated to the substance of any particular message. The provisions quoted earlier show that the OMIA permit scheme, which on its face is neutral as to the content of speech, is not, in application, a means for the state to permit some speech and prohibit other speech based on content. Moreover, with the exception of the distinction between on-premises and off-premises signs, petitioner has not identified any instances in which the state has used its enforcement authority against petitioner or others to permit certain signs and prohibit others based on content. Put differently, because the permit scheme on its face (and, so far as this record demonstrates, also in practice) does not discriminate on the basis of the subject or content of speech, the OMIA does not effectuate government censorship of speech. Notwithstanding the facial validity and content neutrality of the OMIA (other than the on-premises/off-premises distinction), petitioner argues that the fee requirement, as applied, is invalid because it deters speech. Of course, even a minimal fee or tax, at the margin, tends to reduce the level of the activity to which it applies. The real question, however, is whether the fee requirement suppresses speech in such a way that it restrains the free expression of opinion or restricts the right to speak freely on any subject, as protected by Article I, section 8. Fidanque held that the lobbyist registration fee at issue there was impermissible because the statute on its face does not tie the fee to the costs associated with registering lobbyists. 328 Or. at 9, 969 P.2d 376. However, this court assumed that a fee may be charged for the expenses that the government incurs as the result of a particular communicative activity, such as the expense of providing added police protection for a parade. Id. at 8, 969 P.2d 376. Here, as noted, ORS 377.729 expressly ties the fee to the cost of the regulatory program, and petitioner does not argue that the fee is unreasonable or exceeds the cost of the program. [10] On this record, we cannot conclude that the fee requirement is an impermissible restriction on speech. Finally, petitioner argues that the OMIA's permit requirement, as applied, so burdens protected expression that it violates Article I, section 8. In that aspect of its case, petitioner relies on Purcell and City of Eugene v. Miller, 318 Or. 480, 871 P.2d 454 (1994), both of which involved ordinances that effectively prohibited certain forms of speech. In Purcell, the ordinance banned all door-to-door solicitation, while, in Miller, the ordinance permitted the sale of some products on city sidewalks but banned all sales of expressive material. In this case, it is apparent that, by limiting the number of outdoor advertising sign permits to the number of signs that existed in commercial and industrial zones in 1975, the OMIA was intended to, and does, cap the number of those signs that are visible from public highways. Petitioner appears to assert that the fact that it must obtain a permit lawfully to display its signs and that the number of permits is limited means that the OMIA necessarily violates Article I, section 8. We disagree. Outdoor advertising signs, like other forms of expression, may have characteristics that make them uniquely suited to conveying certain messages to certain audiences. If the state were to prohibit billboards  or some other form of expression  entirely, then perhaps there would be reason to consider whether the effect of such a ban restrain[ed] the free expression of opinion or restrict[ed] the right to speak, write, or print freely under Article I, section 8. Cf. Miller, 318 Or. at 487, 871 P.2d 454 (complete ban on sale and distribution of all expressive material, although content neutral, likely would violate Article I, section 8, because it would restrict too greatly `the free expression of opinion' and `the right to speak, write, or print freely on any subject whatever'). But the OMIA differs fundamentally from the complete ban on door-to-door solicitation in Purcell and the blanket exclusion of sellers of books and magazines from the sidewalk marketplace in Miller. The OMIA allows as many outdoor advertising signs (off-premises signs) as existed on June 12, 1975, as well as potentially thousands of on-premises signs. Petitioner has ample avenues to communicate its messages, both on highway signs and by other means. On this record, the permit and fee requirements do not unconstitutionally restrain the free expression of opinion or restrict the right to speak, write, or print freely on any subject whatsoever. For the foregoing reasons, we conclude that the OMIA's provisions regarding the erection and maintenance of signs visible from public highways, including the permit and fee requirements  again with the exception of the statute's different treatment of on-premises and off-premises signs, as discussed below  are content-neutral time, place, and manner restrictions that do not violate Article I, section 8.