Torrance Sets Fines for Unwanted Flyers

The Torrance City Council has made it illegal to leave handbill advertisements at homes and businesses where “no advertisement” signs are posted.

Under an ordinance approved Tuesday and slated to take effect next month, business owners will be fined $100 for each instance in which an unwanted flyer is left at a residence. The proliferation of flyers plugging products and services ranging from pizzas to carpet cleaning prompted 43 North Torrance residents to sign a petition in March urging the council to get a handle on the problem.

They complained of blizzards of handbills left at their doors, driveways and garages and charged in the petition that the flyers were a “menace” responsible for a “great deal of trash littering our streets and yards.”

City Atty. Kenneth L. Nelson said the new ordinance leaves it up to residents whether to allow handbills to be left at their homes. The ordinance “protects their privacy and right to be commercially left alone,” he said.

The regulation does not apply to religious or political literature and throwaway newspapers.

Torrance already prohibits canvassers or solicitors from trying to gain admittance to property where signs are posted that say “no canvassers” or “no solicitors.”