City staff drafts more flexible ordinance for historic signs in Burbank

A proposed historic sign ordinance that Burbank city planners have been hammering out since last year will no longer include a provision that could have allowed city officials to require property owners to have significant pre-1969 signs designated as historic Burbank assets that must be preserved.

An earlier version of the ordinance would have allowed officials to attach the preservation requirement as a condition for approving certain variances requested by a property owner if the city could find an appropriate connection between the accommodation being sought and the potentially historic sign on the property.

The city’s “compulsory designation” authority was removed from the draft ordinance after City Council members this spring expressed concern that it would be unfair to property owners. City staff presented a new draft of the ordinance incorporating a few other tweaks suggested by the council to the city’s Planning Board on Monday.

“Seeing this a second time, there’s quite a bit of flexibility in this,” said Christopher Rizzotti, the Planning Board’s chairman. “I think revamping of this ordinance is pretty solid.”

In January, the Planning Board recommended approval of an earlier version of the ordinance, but the City Council voted 3-2 in April to have the proposed language changed.

The revised document not only eliminates compulsory designation, but removes a section of the ordinance that would have allowed neon signs to be restored in areas where neon is not currently allowed and adds a process for removing the city’s protection of certain historic signs.

Some council members, including Mayor Bob Frutos, had expressed concerns in April that the ordinance, which is intended to encourage businesses to preserve their signs, might make it difficult for future property owners to remove or demolish old signs that had been designated historic at the request of previous owners.

The board will consider whether to recommend the latest draft for City Council approval on Nov. 9.

Under the ordinance, either a property owner or a member of the public can submit an application to have a sign designated, but a property owner must agree to it if submitted by the public. The Heritage Commission must then review and recommend the application, and the City Council must approve it, after which a covenant is entered and registered with the county.

Staff began drafting the ordinance last year after hearing from residents who said they value old signs like the one atop what used to be Papoo’s Hot Dog Show and is now an Umami Burger at Riverside Drive and Rose Street.

Last summer, an architectural consultant hired by the city cataloged nearly 80 potentially historic signs that date back before 1969 throughout the city’s commercial districts. Some of the signs are still largely the way they were at the time they were installed, while others, which may not be eligible for historic designation, have been modified in significant ways.

Misalignment between the modern codes and the features of the old signs may be keeping owners from doing necessary work to preserve them. For instance, a sign that may need to be taken down to be repaired may lose its grandfather status once it comes down.

The draft ordinance would create a process that allows a sign to be protected so that it can be restored, but it also offers incentives for property owners to make life-extending repairs.

Proposed incentives include waiving building-permit fees for preservation work on the signs, reducing or deferring building permit fees by 10% (up to $5,000 per year) for a property with a designated historic sign, increasing allowed signage by 10% on such properties and discounting a historic sign’s square footage from the property’s maximum allowed signage limits.

The new version of the proposed ordinance also outlines the conditions for the city’s Heritage Commission to grant removal of the historic designation at a property owner’s request, provided the owner first seeks someone to donate the sign to, shows that a recipient could not be found and that there are no other economically feasible means of preservation.

“There is a lot of flexibility if someone wanted the designation or wanted to [remove] the designation,” Rizzotti said of the new draft rules.

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Chad Garland, chad.garland@latimes.com

Twitter: @chadgarland