Billboard Insider ran a Q and A in its March 2nd edition on the new book it published and I wrote: Rothfelder and Falick on Billboard Law. As explained in that article, this book examines the unique law on billboards by compiling, organizing, and summarizing over 150 articles my law firm, Rothfelder & Falick, and I wrote and Billboard Insider published in the daily blog over the last decade. It does so in eight chapters surveying this very broad subject: (1) First Amendment challenges and content based sign codes, including the Supreme Court’s 2022 seminal decision in Reagan vs City of Austin; (2) what the operator can display or choose not to display on his billboards, which seems especially relevant in these times of “cancel culture;” (3) permit, taxation, and other governmental disputes; (4) drafting and litigating leases, easements, and ad contracts, including providing sample forms for leases and easements; (5) administrative law developments, which have been extensive during the recent presidential administrations; (6) drafting and litigating asset purchase agreements, including providing a sample form of asset purchase agreement; (7) eminent domain and inverse condemnation of billboards, including the compensation and amortization challenges uniquely facing the out of home industry; and (8) concluding with annual reviews and predictions for future developments in billboard law.
During almost 50 years of legal practice, most of which has specialized in representing the outdoor advertising industry, I’ve learned to appreciate that billboards have become the subject of an extensive body of case, statutory, and administrative law. In fact, in Adams Outdoor vs Town of Mt. Pleasant, United States District Judge David Norton recently observed in a municipal sign code challenge brought by a major outdoor advertiser that “the law of billboards is a law unto itself.” Amen, Your Honor, I couldn’t agree more! This “Law of Billboards” includes, for example, such differences by the various States on the fundamental characterizations of a billboard, i.e., is it real estate, personal property, or something altogether different like a fixture? Many States define and treat billboards differently depending on whether they are assessed for real or personal property taxes. Further, no matter what they call them, the States also differ on how to value and compensate for billboards removed and taken to accommodate highway or other public improvements in eminent domain. In short, billboard law has developed as a complicated mix of real estate, contract, and tort principals unique to other types of property rights and assets in the Country.
The readers of Billboard Insider, which might be attracted to this book, are probably painfully familiar with the “Song of the Open Road,” the short poem by the late American poet and humorous Ogden Nash (8/19/1902-5/19/1971):
I think that I shall never see
A billboard lovely as a tree
Indeed, unless the billboards fall
I’ll never see a tree at all.
With all due respect to Mr. Nash, however, I doubt he ever saw an LED illuminated bulletin, remotely controlled by computerized digital technology, that generated well into the six figures in annual advertising revenue. The owner of such an asset, by contrast, would undoubtedly see it as quite lovely, and indeed, worthy of every degree of legal protection.
To quote a more contemporary American poet, Bob Dylan, “the times [like billboard law], they’re a changin.” This book hopes to capture the current state of some of the important areas of the changing law of billboards. I hope y’all enjoy it!
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