Billboard Reduction Plan Tentatively OKd : Advertising: City Council splits 4 to 3 on 20-year agreement that will bring down 30 old signs in exchange for approval to erect 10 along freeways.

The City Council has given tentative approval to an agreement that would enable an advertising firm to tear down half the old billboards in Pomona and replace them with 10 large double-facing signs along area freeways.

The agreement, approved on a 4-3 vote, would authorize Regency Outdoor Advertising Inc. to remove 30 old billboards within a year, reserve at least 10% of its new signs for Pomona businesses and put up a “Shop in Pomona” promotion sign three months a year. At the end of the contract, Regency would be required to tear down all of the billboards.

The council made several amendments in the agreement Monday night, including a reduction in the length of the contract from 25 years to 20. J. Keith Stephens, Regency project manager, said the changes are acceptable.

The amended contract will result in a dramatic change in billboards in Pomona. Many of the signs on Holt Avenue and Mission Boulevard would be removed. Six new signs would be placed on the Orange Freeway (57), two along the Corona Expressway (71) and two along the Pomona Freeway (60).

The agreement, which would impose fees as high as $12,000 for some signs, would give the city hundreds of thousands of dollars in revenue over the life of the contract.

Councilwoman Nell Soto, who supported the agreement, noted that 11 of the 30 signs to be removed would be taken down in her district in the city’s west end.

“I think I’m doing my constituents a great service by getting these billboards removed,” she said.

But Councilwoman Paula Lantz, who opposed the agreement, said the city is getting rid of unsightly signs on surface streets and putting them along freeways.

“We’re going to take these eyesores and sleaze out of the inner city and put them at the entrances to the city,” she complained.

Jean Todd, who has been fighting billboards in Pomona for 30 years, said the city could solve the problem by setting a deadline for the existing billboards to be removed without agreeing to new signs elsewhere.

“There was no need to give away the store,” she said.

But Councilman Tomas Ursua, who voted with Soto and Councilmen Ken West and Willie E. White for the agreement, said that even though recent court decisions have indicated that cities can order signs removed if sign companies are given time to recoup their investment, it would still take a legal fight to accomplish that locally.

He said a lawsuit challenging Pomona’s billboard ordinance has been unresolved for 26 years.

The billboard ordinance will come back to the council for final approval Feb. 22. Meanwhile, though it would not affect the agreement with Regency, residents opposed to billboards are circulating a petition calling for an election to ban new billboards.

Billboard opponent Milo Rodich said council members who support the Regency agreement are “not in touch with the people because people don’t want billboards.” He predicted there would be no problem gathering the required 6,308 signatures by a June 14 deadline.