The City’s Sign By-law has been in effect since June 2014. City staff have enforced the Sign By-law over the course of four different elections (2 municipal, 1 provincial and 1 federal) using the same procedures. Candidates received the sign by-law and enforcement procedures in their candidates’ packages, and these have more recently been distributed a second time to all candidates. The by-law is available at: http://sarnia.ca/city-government/elections/election-signs.
As directed by City Council, any signs placed on public land are to be proactively enforced, meaning that signs may be removed without notice. We provide a warning and do not issue fines for a first offence. Any subsequent offences are subject to fines as set out in the By-Law. This procedure is followed for other types of signs included in the Sign By-law outside of election signs.
By-law Enforcement responds to signs on private land only after receiving a complaint. This is because staff are required to enter onto private property and to deal with land owners.
To date City Staff have conducted 2 enforcement blitzes during the election and removed over 100 signs comprised of over 30 candidates/businesses/events.