Court Opinion

ID: 9491739
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 14:22:18.246952+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:54:55.000971
License: Public Domain

WELLFORD, Circuit Judge,
concurring.
I concur in the result reached in this difficult case, but I express my disagreement with the majority’s determination in part III A.l. that SORTA’s advertisement policy created a “designated public forum.” I think it clear, as determined by the district court, that SORTA did not make its exterior bus advertising space “generally available” to entities such as Local 1099 on an essentially unrestricted basis. See Arkansas Educ. Television Comm’n v. Forbes, — U.S.-, 118 S.Ct. 1633, 1641, 140 L.Ed.2d 875 (1998).
An analysis of the merits of a claim that the state has restricted First Amendment freedoms by denying access to public property, as the Union urges in this case, requires a court to place the public property at issue in one of three categories: traditional public fora, designated public fora, or nonpublic fora. See Cornelius v. NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc., 473 U.S. 788, 802, 105 S.Ct. 3439, 87 L.Ed.2d 567 (1985); Perry Educ. Ass’n. v. Perry Local Educators’ Ass’n., 460 U.S. 37, 45-46, 103 S.Ct. 948, 74 L.Ed.2d 794 (1983). In the first two types, the state may enact content-neutral time, place, and manner restrictions on speech so long as those restrictions serve a significant government interest and “leave open alternative channels of communication.” Local No. 1099 v. SORTA, No. 97-512 (S.D.Ohio Sept. 15,1998) (district court order in this case which granted the preliminary injunction and which relied on Cornelius and Perry). The state may also enact content-based restrictions in these two fora if the restriction is necessary to serve a compelling state interest and is narrowly drawn to achieve it. Id. In the case of a nonpublic forum, however, the state may enforce not only content-neutral time, place, and manner restrictions, but may also “reserve the forum for its intended purposes, communicative or otherwise, as long as the regulation on speech is reasonable and not an effort to suppress expression merely because public officials oppose the speaker’s view.” Perry, 460 U.S. at 46, 103 S.Ct. 948. A threshold question on the analysis of likelihood of success on the merits, therefore, is what sort of forum Metro buses are.
*365Transit system advertising space does not automatically constitute a public forum. See Lehman v. City of Shaker Heights, 418 U.S. 298, 304, 94 S.Ct. 2714, 41 L.Ed.2d 770 (1974) (plurality opinion). Property that is not traditionally a public forum may, however, become a public forum if the state allows the property to be used as a place for expressive activity. See Perry, 460 U.S. at 45, 103 S.Ct. 948. In deciding whether the state has allowed its property to become a public forum, courts should look at “the policy and practice of the government to ascertain whether it intended to designate a place not traditionally open to assembly and debate as a public forum.” Cornelius, 473 U.S. at 802, 105 S.Ct. 3439. Courts that have found that advertising space on -transit systems has become a public forum have done so where the transit authority maintained no system of control over the ads its accepts. See Planned Parenthood Ass’n/Chicago Area v. Chicago Transit Auth., 767 F.2d 1225, 1232 (7th Cir.1985) (noting that access was “virtually guaranteed to anyone willing to pay the fee”); Coalition for Abortion Rights and Against Sterilization Abuse v. Niagara Frontier Transp. Auth., 584 F.Supp. 985, 989 (W.D.N.Y.1984) (noting that no witness could recall an instance in which an ad had been rejected for content).
Unlike the situation in Planned Parenthood and Coalition for Abortion Rights, SORTA has vigorously enforced its advertising policy. Not only does the policy state that SORTA advertising space is not a public forum, it makes clear that all ads are subject to SORTA’s approval. Furthermore, SORTA’s practice is consistent with its written policy’s intent to maintain the advertising space as a nonpublie forum. Although it accepts a wide range of ads, it has also rejected various ads that did not meet the criteria outlined in the policy. Thus, SORTA, in fact, has prevented its advertising space from becoming a public forum for First Amendment expression. I would hold that the district court properly concluded that SORTA’s ad space constituted a nonpublic forum. As such, the restriction on speech, which forms the basis for this case, will stand if it “is reasonable in light of the purpose which the forum at issue serves.” Perry, 460 U.S. at 49, 103 S.Ct. 948.
The majority concedes that “the Supreme Court has been reluctant to hold that the government intended to create a designated public forum when it followed a policy of selective access for individual speakers rather than allowing general access for an entire class of speakers,” see Majority Opinion ¶ 19, and that SORTA had an “apparently consistent policy of limiting access to its advertising space.” Majority Opinion ¶ 31. This should be dispositive of the issue, but the majority instead reaches the opposite conclusion, relying primarily on Christ’s Bride Ministries, Inc. v. SEPTA, 148 F.3d 242 (3d Cir.1998), which I do not find to be persuasive. The policies and practices of SEPTA differed materially from those of SORTA. Unlike the majority, I find SORTA’s purposes for limiting advertising were related to the forum’s intended use and that SORTA has not transformed the buses into a designated public forum. See Citizens for Hyland v. SORTA No. 98-713 (S.D.Ohio Oct. 2, 1998) (order denying preliminary injunction in case with the same defendant and indistinguishable facts).
Despite the disagreement expressed above, I concur with the majority’s alternative rationale in part III A.2. which affirms the decision of the district court with respect to the reasonableness of SORTA’s actions. I find this issue to be very close, particularly in light of the facts and decision in Citizens for Hyland, supra. I would, accordingly, AFFIRM the district court despite my reservations about whether SORTA’s actions in this ease were unreasonable as claimed by the majority.