Badly Posted Placards Are His Crusade

One of the city’s most vocal critics of campaign signs has been patrolling flood control channels and removing any illegally placed placards--with a county official’s blessing.

Allan Morton, 72, a property manager and graphic artist, began this week and will monitor the channels through November.

Orange County Supervisor Don Saltarelli said Wednesday that he has agreed to pay Morton $1 a month to do the job.

“He has my moral support. He has to do whatever he feels he wants to do,” Saltarelli said. “I don’t want to encourage or discourage him, but if he continues to take the signs down safely and nobody gets hurt, I’ll send him the dollar a month after the election.”

For Morton, fighting the signs has become a personal crusade.

“This is a sad case for democracy,” Morton said of placards on public and private property across town. “The guy that wallpapers the city with the most signs wins, and I think that’s stupid.”

Morton said he has already removed about 60 illegally placed signs, most for Fullerton City Council and school board candidates.

In Fullerton, no citations are given for campaign signs posted on city property during the election season. But signs are illegal on county and federal property, such as flood control channels.

Morton said he thinks the blizzard of cardboard indicates that many voters “don’t know if [the candidate] can speak or how he stands on the issues.”

“There should be more town hall debates, where the general public can ask questions, so people can get a chance to see how well the guy speaks on his feet,” said Morton, who began complaining about the proliferation of political signs during the 1992 election.

“I think that, if there were more town hall debates and less signs, our country, our county and our city would be better off.”