The US Supreme Court declined to review the ruling of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit that Tennessee’s billboard law was unconstitutional.   The ruling invalidated Tennessee’s sign code.  On June 25, 2020 Tennessee’s Governor Bill Lee signed legislation to revise Tennessee’s sign rules to fix the issues caused by the ruling and allowed the state to reinstitute controls on billboards.

Insider’s take:  Tennessee fixed its sign code by switching the basis for sign regulations away from on/off premise signs to whether signs produce revenue.  The other states in the Sixth Circuit (Ohio, Michigan and Kentucky) have yet to fix their codes. In May a judge in Kentucky relied on the Thomas case to rule that Kentucky’s billboard act is unconstitutional.  If you are an operator in Kentucky, Ohio or Michigan you should be urging your state’s legislators to adopt the Tennessee or Texas fix to their sign codes in order to avoid a court challenge which creates regulatory chaos with respect to billboards.

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