The director of Scenic Kentucky is calling on the state legislature to block new administrative regulations on highway billboards from the State Transportation Cabinet.
Paul Bergman is especially concerned about rules that allow use of brighter, LED light fixtures on the signs.
Bergman says he’s offended by new regulations that permit the pruning of trees and other vegetation near billboards. He says brighter, LED lighting on billboards is dangerous and could cause accidents.
Bergman testified last week before House and Senate members of the Kentucky Legislature’s Interim Joint Committee on Transportation.
The Kentucky Transportation Cabinet’s chief legal counsel says the Commonwealth has tried to ban LED lighting on billboards but courts have sided with the advertising industry.
Rebecca Goodman says appeals courts have twice ruled against the Cabinet in LED cases. She says the regulations on billboards the Highway Department has developed over the past three years should reduce the total number of signs along the highways.
Goodman says that allows for local control over the signs.
As for pruning, she says, the new regulations require advertisers to submit a plan from a certified arborist that details work to be done. Goodman says the cabinet has the right to reject such plans.
