San Gabriel : Searching for Illegal Signs

City officials on the lookout for illegal business signs are conducting a street-by-street review to track them down.

Authorities estimate that as many as two out of every five signs in San Gabriel violate city standards. As part of a five-month review process, owners of businesses with offending signs are being notified and asked to make changes.

Last May, the City Council revised its sign regulations in hopes of achieving greater uniformity and better aesthetics. Roof signs, pole signs and animated signs were outlawed.

Code enforcement officer Anthony Estrada said an earlier survey of the city’s 1,821 signs found that more than 700 violated the law. Seventy signs had been abandoned.

Estrada said the city is first trying a cooperative approach. “We’re trying to work with people,” he said. “We’re not trying to lay down the heavy arm of the law.”

But, he warned, for owners who don’t change illegal signs, “there will come a time, in a month or two, when we may declare some of these signs as public nuisances.”