Agenda Item # 10.1 - Natalie C. Kirkish | Received 03/17/2023
19309265.12
Hanson Bridgett LLP
1676 N. California Blvd., Suite 620, Walnut Creek, CA 94596
NATALIE C. KIRKISH ASSOCIATE
DIRECT DIAL (415) 995-6351
DIRECT FAX (415) 995-3549
E-MAIL nkirkish@hansonbridgett.com
HUONG (JENNY) V. DAO ASSOCIATE
DIRECT DIAL (925) 746-8772
DIRECT FAX (925) 746-8490
E-MAIL jdao@hansonbridgett.com
March 17, 2023
VIA ELECTRONIC MAIL
Marie Blankley, Mayor of the City of Gilroy
Members of the Gilroy City Council
City of Gilroy 7351 Rosanna Street
Gilroy, CA 95020
CityClerk@cityofgilroy.org
Andrew Faber
City Attorney
Berliner Cohen LLP 10 Almaden Blvd.
11th Floor San Jose, CA 95113
andrew.faber@berliner.com
jolie.houston@berliner.com
Re: Item 9 , March 20, 2023 City Council Hearing; Appeal of Planning Commission Decision
to Deny Proposed Electronic Billboard Ordinance; Response to Public Comment
Dear Mayor Blankley, Honorable Members of the City Council, and Mr. Faber:
During the course of the past few weeks, the City has received voluminous comments on the
proposal by local businessperson Mike Conrotto to change the City's municipal code to allow
two electronic billboards in the City of Gilroy.
We have carefully tracked each public comment on this Electronic Billboard Ordinance and
prepared the following responses. These responses are submitted on behalf of the Project
Appellant, Outfront Media, Inc. ("Appellant") who, as you know, appealed the Planning
Commission's February 2, 2023 denial of the proposed billboard ordinance.1
In general, while many members of the community raise important issues concerning digital
displays in the City, some comments — particularly those of outside interest groups who style
themselves as "fairy Godmothers and Godfathers" here to enlighten the City — verge on being
irresponsible, if not absurd. One commenter, for instance, has suggested that two digital signs in Gilroy would change the color of the sky. The truth, as supported by the facts, is that the
digital signs would produce light a tenth as bright as a full moon. Another commenter, after
repeatedly declaring that digital signs cause cancer and other diseases, buries in his rhetoric an
acknowledgement that, in truth, "[n]o study has concluded that digital signs cause disease and
other maladies."
We have thoroughly vetted all public comments for legal claims and, as documented below,
have determined these comments raise no legal issues. While this document is long, the format
is reader-friendly and essentially lists every public comment the City has received to date, and
1 Please note that the Appellant has also proposed, separate from the Electronic Billboard
Ordinance Project, a development agreement for a specific location at 6460 Automall Parkway
("Proposed Sign Location").
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 2
19309265.12
provides a response to that comment. This format allows the Council to skip to those comments
that interested its members most. Comments are organized by speaker/writer, and ordered
chronologically, such that the most recent comments appear towards the end of this letter.
With no legal infirmities, the City Council can therefore focus on policy considerations, balancing economic, environmental, and other concerns. To this end, we submit that a thoughtful digital
sign ordinance can bring the City tremendous economic benefits without altering its character.
The proposed ordinance fits this bill, in that it only allows two digital displays (something a city
can do, as the City of Santa Clara has done), and only allows such displays in urbanized,
commercial and industrial environments. The Appellants Proposed Sign Location is a case in
point, and would situate a display in a paved lot, amid auto sales businesses replete with
illuminated signage and other lights. We have included pictures and satellite images as
attachments to this letter, so the City Council can see this location. We note, too, that more than
90 residents and business owners in Gilroy have expressed support for the ordinance.
As noted above, we have prepared a measured, legal response to each public comment below. It is not necessary that the City Council read every response to comment, and its members may
focus on those comments or issues that interest them most.
A Comment Letter submitted by Dr. Paul D. Lynam on January 18, 2023
Comment Response
1 The University of California’s Lick Observatory is a scientific, technological and historical
marvel. Since its first (1882) contribution to
humankind’s understanding of the universe,
Lick has continuously innovated novel
technologies and techniques, training and serving generations of scientists, including
Nobel laureates. Since before the 1970s, the
accelerating growth of light pollution
(alternatively referred to as
Anthropogenic/Artificial Light At Night, ALAN)
has increasingly negatively impacted the observatory’s operation, mission and probably
(since the United Nations cites ALAN as a
probable carcinogen) public health. In visible
light, ALAN chiefly results from the physics of
photon scattering by atmospheric aerosol particles – a process not accounted for in the
Mitigated Negative Declaration (MND).
Scattering is responsible for twilights, renders
clear daytime skies as blue and cloudy skies
as gray.
The comment does not question the content or conclusions of the Electronic Billboard
Ordinance Project (“Project”) Initial
Study/Mitigated Negative Declaration
(“MND”), so no response is warranted. As
explained in detail below, the Project MND fully complies with all applicable requirements
of the California Environmental Quality Act
(“CEQA,” Pub. Resources Code, § 21000 et
seq.) and the CEQA Guidelines (14 Cal.
Code Regs. § 15000 et seq.). As discussed
in Response # A9, there is no substantial evidence that Artificial Light at Night ("ALAN")
causes cancer. There is no question that the
pursuit of astronomical research is an
important endeavor. However, as discussed
in Responses #A2 and #A8, the legal framework set forth under CEQA does not
require the MND to analyze the Project’s
impact on the ability of the University of
California’s Lick Observatory to use its
telescopes. Additionally, as discussed in
Responses # A6 and #A13, the Project would
not contribute to the scattered-light effect to a
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 3
19309265.12
discernable level. Please note the following
facts:
(1) the distance between the Appellant's
Proposed Sign Location and the Lick
Observatory is 25 miles;
(2) the sign facings at this location would not
be oriented toward the observatory and, indeed, one of the displays would face the
opposite direction; and
(3) there appear to be intervening ridges
between the observatory and the Proposed
Sign Location.
It is light pollution from the City of San Jose,
which has a population of almost 1 million
(and where the San Jose metropolitan area
has a population almost twice that), that
creates conflict with Observatory operations.
Even if two additional displays were situated in the City of San Jose, individual and
cumulative contributions to light levels would
not be considerable, regardless of the way
the digital screens faced.
Each of the foregoing facts is illustrated in
plain detail in Attachment A, and we would
encourage the City and its decisionmakers to
review this information.
2 In responding to MND comments, the
Appellant team repeat statements of the form
“the proposed project’s impact on Lick
Observatory is not an environmental impact
under CEQA” (the California Environmental
Quality Act). Thus, the Appellants implicitly concede that there is an impact on Lick
Observatory, that the impact is indeed
environmental, but is not required by CEQA.
By not considering light pollution as an
environmental phenomenon, dark sky
advocates maintain that CEQA is deficient.
Hence, an Environmental Impact Report (EIR)
is preferred.
The commenter has made an irresponsible
argument. No one has conceded, implicitly or
otherwise, that the Project will result in an
environmental impact to Lick Observatory.
The Project’s impact on Lick Observatory is
not an environmental impact under CEQA as a matter of law and, while the City can
certainly take into account the concerns of
the commenter, the City is not obligated to
evaluate any such potential impacts. CEQA
defines the "environment" as "the physical
conditions which exist within the area which
will be affected by a proposed project,
including land, air, water, minerals, flora,
fauna, noise, objects of historic or aesthetic
significance." Pub. Resources Code, §
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 4
19309265.12
21060.5. As such, under CEQA, a public
agency is only required to evaluate the Project's impacts on specifically identified
resource areas, including aesthetics,
agriculture and forestry resources, air quality,
biological resources, cultural resources,
geology and soils, greenhouse gas emissions, hazards and hazardous materials,
hydrology and water quality, land use and
planning, mineral resources, noise,
population and housing, public services,
recreation, transportation and traffic, tribal
cultural resources, and utilities and service
systems. CEQA Guidelines Appendix G.
Impacts to scientific, or astronomical pursuits,
are not one of the categories of
environmental impact identified by CEQA for
evaluation. The MND evaluates the impact of light from the billboard on several resources,
including biological resources and traffic
hazards. However, it is not required to
evaluate the Project's impacts on
astronomical research because such is not a
resources covered under CEQA. An EIR is
not required here.
An MND is appropriate when all potentially
significant effects of the project will be
avoided or reduced to insignificance through the use of mitigation measures. Pub .
Resources Code, § 21080(c)(2); 14 Cal.
Code Regs. § 15070(b). Here, an MND is
appropriate because after incorporation of
mitigation measures, which include measures
to minimize light and glare and traffic hazards
for vehicle drivers along US-101 and
minimize impacts to biological resources, the
Project will not cause a direct or indirect
substantial adverse effect on the
environment.
Notwithstanding the above, the commenter
has not provided substantial evidence that
the development of two signs in Gilroy,
located 25 miles away and situated among
billions of other light sources, would
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 5
19309265.12
materially affect operations at the
observatory.
3 Does the City value a red sunset? Does the
City consider dusk, dawn and blue skies to be
environmental phenomena?
As discussed in in Response #A2, Public
Resources Code section 21060.5 defines
“environment” to mean “the physical conditions which exists within the area which
will be affected by a proposed project
including land, air, water, minerals, flora,
fauna, ambient noise, and objects of historic
or aesthetic significance. See also 14 Cal. Code Regs., § 15360. The MND fully
evaluated the environmental impacts of light
pollution and impacts on aesthetics in the
manner CEQA requires. There is no evidence
that two digital signs in Gilroy, which would
be a couple sources out of billions of other Bay Area light sources, would change the
color of the sky.
4 If yes, then the phenomenon of light pollution (arising from identical physics) is also
environmental and CEQA alone (and, by
extrapolation, the MND) is inadequate. Hence,
the proposal should be subject to an EIR.
As discussed in Response #A2 above, an EIR is not required because there is no
substantial evidence that the Project will
cause an unmitigated environmental impact,
and the suggestion that two digital billboards
would change the color of the sky is preposterous. The MND evaluated the impact
of the Project, and determined that the
proposed electronic billboard would not
create a substantial change in illumination
levels due to baseline light sources.
Here, if the proposed billboard ordinance is
adopted, the Appellant's preferred sign
location is situated in an area with dozens of
light sources on the same scale, including
without limitation dozens of parking lot lights,
an existing illuminated Caltrans sign, illuminated signage from surrounding
businesses, and a fairly constant stream of
vehicle headlights on the adjacent highway.
The appellant's signs direct light downward,
toward highway traffic, and have a minimal
light footprint, as addressed in numerous
instances in the administrative record.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 6
19309265.12
5 If no, then the Commission should attend to
misapprehensions (see accompanying pages) contained in the MND before acceptance.
Further, if accepting the MND, the City should
remain mindful of the conditions of approval
outlined in the (25 October 2022) informational
meeting; if billboard(s) are not in compliance,
approval shall be void within one year.
The proposed ordinance does not state that
approval shall be void within one year if the billboard is not in compliance. Instead, it
states that if the billboard is not in compliance
with the City Agreement and/or the conditions
of approval, the City will hold a hearing. If the
City finds that a violation has occurred, there
is an opportunity to abate the violation.
6 The October meeting (and the MND) asserted
“the billboard light is only going to be able to be perceived [up to] 250 feet from the location of
the billboard”. Therefore, if it is subsequently
demonstrated (by any entity) that billboard light
is perceptible from a distance greater than 250
feet, then the billboard(s) shall be deemed in
violation and approval shall be void within one
year.
This comment also constitutes an
irresponsible one, and is based on misstatements of facts that are well-
established. Light from signs will be visible
beyond 250 feet, but brightness levels
associated with the digital displays generally
will not be perceived on a light meter.
More specifically, the threshold at issue is not whether any light is perceptible beyond 250
feet. The threshold is whether brightness
levels beyond 250 feet would exceed 0.3
foot-candles above ambient conditions. To
clarify some of the facts at hand, the proposed billboard would be operated at one-
sixth the illumination intensity standards in
the California Outdoor Advertising Act and
Vehicle Code. Specifically, the display would
be limited to a maximum light output level of
0.3 foot-candle at 250 feet from the billboard
above ambient conditions, which is equivalent
to 300 nits, a significantly more conservative
lighting intensity standard for electronic
billboards of the State maximum of 1,173 nits.
At this lighting level, light cast beyond 250 feet would not register on a light meter,
ensuring the proposed display does not make
a considerable contribution to any lighting
impact. The Appellant’s lighting expert has
evaluated the Project and can confirm the
sign will lose luminance and visibility above
14 degrees and, coupled with the horizontal
viewing angle of approximately 40 degrees,
the viewing angle of the sign will be narrow.
Even at 250 feet nearer to the ground, where light levels would not exceed 0.3 foot
candles, the billboard would produce a peak
value of 27 candelas per square foot (cd/sq.
ft). By comparison, a full moon at its brightest
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 7
19309265.12
generates about 232 cd/sq. ft. All of this
assumes the display would broadcast a solid white background where, in practice,
advertisements contain a variety of colors
(meaning lighting levels would even be less
than a tenth of light cast from a full moon).
Further, and as mentioned in Response #A5, any allegation of noncompliance with the City
Agreement or conditions of approval does not
void the approval. Rather, there is an
opportunity for a hearing and time to abate a
violation.
7 Lick Observatory is in its 141st unbroken year
of deploying ever more sensitive light-detecting
apparatus, keeping an eye on the sky. On
innumerable occasions, the eyes of the scientific world have focused on the
astronomical discoveries made from Santa
Clara County’s highest peak. Many
Californians justifiably treasure the
observatory, its legacy and ongoing mission. In the event of a precedent-setting decision,
contravening the laudable existing moratorium
on billboards, one hopes that the people of
Gilroy may equivalently cherish the
proliferation of electronic message centers –
and concomitant incidence of cancer among its
citizenry - 50 and 140 years hence.
The commenter misunderstands the
proposal. The proposed billboard ordinance
caps the number of digital signs at two within
the entire City. It is not precedence for the approval of more signs, but includes a hard
limit encoded in a Citywide ordinance.
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND or otherwise raise
legal issues, so no legal response is warranted. Please see Response #A9 for an
explanation of why there is no substantial
evidence that the Project will cause cancer.
8 Misapprehension 1: PROS for Electronic
Billboard Ordinance Project (p 528 of packet)
“11. It will NOT contribute to light pollution as
opponents claim.” Rationale: Regrettably, this
statement is incorrect. Regardless of the
technology and originating fixture, any light
source which interacts with the atmosphere contributes an additive effect to the
phenomenon of light pollution/ALAN, elevating
the intensity of the sky background. For an
accessible summary, including public health
implications, see Bogard (2013) and scholarly
references therein.
Please see Responses #A2 and #A6. The
MND never states that the Project will not
contribute to light pollution. Rather, the MND
acknowledges the sign has the potential to
impact the physical environment, and fully
analyzes this impact. The MND fully accounts
for and mitigates the impact of the maximum ambient light output level of .3 foot-candle at
250 feet from the billboards on nearby
sensitive uses and on driver distraction.
(MND, pp. 21-22.) It also evaluates potential
impacts of increase in illumination levels on
migrating birds. (MND, p. 41.)
In order for an impact on the environment to
be significant, it must result in a "substantial
or potentially substantial, adverse change in
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 8
19309265.12
the environment." Pub. Resources Code, §
21068. T o assess the changes to the environment that will result from a project, the
agency normally treats existing physical
conditions at the time CEQA review begins as
the environmental baseline against which the
project's changes to the environment are measured. 14 Cal. Code Regs., § 15125.
Because the existing environment already
has high illumination levels, the Project,
which would situate digital signs in
commercial/industrial areas, would not create
a substantial change in illumination levels.
The Proposed Sign Location is illustrative of
this fact; it is located adjacent to a Tesla
dealership amid multiple light sources. Please
see Attachment B.
To the extent that Dr. Lynam is arguing that the Project will cause a cumulative impact on
light pollution, he is also incorrect. CEQA
only requires discussion of a cumulative
impact when the cumulative impact is
significant, and the Project's incremental
contribution is "cumulatively considerable." 14
Cal. Code Regs., § 15130(a). The public
agency may find that the significance of a
project's contribution to a cumulative impact
is too speculative to determine, provided the finding is based on a thorough investigation
of the issue. Rialto Citizens for Responsible
Growth v. City of Rialto (2012) 208
Cal.App.4th 899. The MND expressly found
that the Project's lighting would not result in
significant cumulative impacts. MND, p. 109.
While the Project's lighting would have the
potential to cumulate with other projects, the
performance standards that limit operation to
a maximum of .3 foot-candle at 250 feet and
require the billboard to be dimmable to ambient light conditions consider existing light
conditions and ensure the contribution would
not be considerable. MND, p. 109.
Additionally, the MND concluded there are no
reasonably foreseeable development projects in the immediate vicinities of the Proposed
Sign Location that would have lighting
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 9
19309265.12
impacts that could cumulate with the
proposed project’s lighting. MND, p. 109.
9 ALAN is significantly correlated for all forms of
cancer including lung, breast, colorectal, and
prostate cancer. Immediate measures should be taken to reduce artificial light at night in the
main cities around the world (Al-Nagger & Anil
2016).
Dr . Lynam has not provided any substantial
evidence that the Project would cause an
individual, or even cumulatively considerable, cancer-causing impact. Dr. Lynam relies on
only one study, the “Artificial Light at Night
and Cancer: Global Study” by Al-Naggar, A.,
Anil, S to support his argument that there is a
correlation between ALAN and cancer. This single article is not substantial evidence
because it shows limited correlation, not
causation, the article focuses on "protected
areas" rather than urban areas, and is
therefore irrelevant, and the article's
reasoning is flawed.
Respectfully, Dr. Lynam is an astronomer,
and is not an expert in cancer. As a result, his
opinion on an electronic billboard causing
cancer is a layperson opinion. Under CEQA,
expert opinion supported by facts constitutes substantial evidence. Public Resources
Code, §§ 21080(e) and 21082.2(c). On the
other hand, substantial evidence cannot be
shown through speculation, unsubstantiated
opinion, or evidence that is not credible. Id.
Expert opinion may be disregarded if it
relates to a subject outside the expert's field.
Newtown Preservation Soc'y v. County of El
Dorado (2021) 65 Cal.App.5th 771, 789. And,
testimony by laypersons on technical issues
does not qualify as substantial evidence.
Bowman v. City of Berkeley (2004) 122
Cal.App.4th 572, 583 (neighbor testimony
about hazards was not substantial evidence
because neighbors had no expert
background on complex subject on migration
of chemicals). Additionally, a lead agency
may reject testimony that lacks an adequate
factual foundation; Clews Land & Livestock v.
City of San Diego (2017) 19 Cal.App.5th 161,
195 (neighbors’ predictions about project’s traffic impacts were not supported by specific
factual foundation). Furthermore, expert
opinion that is not directly relevant to the
Project’s environmental impacts may be
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 10
19309265.12
disregarded. Id. at 194 (expert’s general
observations about fire hazards, questions about project, and criticism of negative
declaration did not amount to evidence of
potentially significant impact); Citizens for
Responsible Dev. v. City of W. Hollywood
(1995) 39 Cal.App.4th 490, 502 (letters from state historic preservation officer relating to
different site were not relevant to project
before agency); Newberry Springs Waters
Ass’n v. County of San Bernardino (1984)
150 Cal.App.3d 740, 750 (letter from expert
comme nting generally about excess nitrate
loading of groundwater was irrelevant to
project before agency). As noted above, the
report cited by the commenter is irrelevant.
The article consists of an ecological study
focused on “protected areas,” meaning wildlife, forests, national parks, and reserves.
It therefore has no application to the City of
Gilroy, which is in close proximity to the larger
Bay Area metropolis, is already urbanized,
and populated with light sources. The article
looks at data from 158 countries, and there is
no control for local geography. The Al-Naggar
article, therefore, is not substantial evidence
of a significant impact caused by the Project.
Dr. Lynam's opinions are also not substantial evidence because they lack specificity about
how the Project may cause cancer. An
agency need not accept evidence that lacks
specificity or fails to adequately explain why
the Project might cause a significant impact.
Rominger v. County of Colusa (2014) 229
Cal.App.4th 690, overruled in part on other
grounds by Union of Med. Marijuana Patients,
Inc. v. City of San Diego (2019) 7 Cal.5th
1171 (expert's opinion that mitigation for
odors might be inadequate is too vague to amount to substantial evidence); Parker
Shattuck Neighbors v. Berkeley City Council
(2013) 222 Cal.App.4th 768 (expert's
suggestion that further investigation of health
risks due to contamination be undertaken "is not evidence, much less substantial
evidence, of an adverse impact"); Lucas
Valley Homeowners Ass'n v. County of Marin
(1991) 233 Cal.App.3d 130, 157 (agency
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 11
19309265.12
could disregard comments from expert that
amounted to "irrelevant generalization, too vague and nonspecific to amount to
substantial evidence of anything")
One big issue is that the commenter confuses
causation with correlation. The Al -Naggar
article does not conclude that electronic billboards cause cancer. Rather, it looks at
the correlation between ALAN and cancer
rate and finds that there is not a significant
correlation between the two. In order for an
environmental effect to be significant, it must
be caused by the Project. 14 Cal. Code
Regs., § 15064. Correlation is not enough to
establish a significant impact under CEQA,
and therefore Dr. Lynam has not provided
any evidence of a potentially significant
impact. This article is not substantial evidence that the Project will cause a
significant health impact because the findings
within the article contradict its conclusion
about the potential causal relationship
between ALAN and cancer. Furthermore, the
Al-Naggar omits the p-value of the correlation
between PAHI and cancer. (Al-Naggar article,
p. 4663.) This means that the paper's finding
of a correlation between exposure to ALAN
and cancer is unsupported. For further detail, please see the Appellant's February 17, 2023
appeal, which is incorporated herein by this
reference.
10 Misapprehension 2: Response to comments on MND: I2 (pp 501-502 of packet) and J2 (pp
503-504 of packet) "The proposed display is 25
miles away from the observatory, and there is
no evidence the display will affect, individual or
cumulatively observatory operations."
Rationale: Applying the physics of aerosol
scattering to model sky brightness arising from
lighting use can be enormously complex. As far
as can be determined, the assessments
described in the MND are arrived at empirically, using light-meters viewing directly
along lines-of-sight to billboard surfaces and
take no account of atmospheric scattering. A
physical model describing light pollution via
As discussed in Responses #A2 and #A8 the Project's impact on Lick Observatory is not an
environmental impact under CEQA and the
MND is not obligated to analyze any such
potential impacts on Lick Observatory’s
activities. Preparation of an EIR would neither
address nor solve Lick Observatory’s concern
about light pollution’s interference with its
ability to use its telescopes. If the Project
were approved, one of the signs the City
would then consider would face southeast and away from Lick Observatory, and the
other board would be facing north. (See
Attachment A).
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 12
19309265.12
interaction of artificial light with the atmosphere
was developed by Garstang throughout the 1980s. Garstang (1989a) includes some
simplifying assumptions and is the most
widely-adopted description. Using Garstang's
model, Duriscoe et al. (2018) quantify the
effects of metropolitan light impacting
astronomical sites up to 200-300 km away.
Additionally, the Observatory is adjacent to
San Jose, a mega city that is much brighter than Gilroy. Meanwhile, Gilroy is 25 miles
away from the Observatory. If the Lick
Observatory is reviewing light sources within
25 miles of its facility, this radius would
encompass the San Jose metropolitan area, urban areas within the East Bay, and urban
areas within the San Francisco peninsula.
Collectively, these area accommodate
millions of residents, businesses, and cars,
with light sources potentially in the billions.
There is no evidence that an LED display
located 25 miles away, and which would
adhere to strict brightness controls, would
have any noticeable effect on brightness
observed at the Lick Observatory.
(Attachment C.) As a result, the comments regarding the impact of light pollution on
observatories does not provide substantial
evidence that the lights from the billboard
would cause any perceptible increase in light
pollution.
11 In 1989, of 17 major (exclusively US-based)
observatories, Lick was ranked among the top
3 most heavily light polluted astronomical sites
(Garstang 1989b) at visible wavelengths.
Estimates suggest that light emissions are
increasing at a faster rate than that of
population growth (Gaston & Sanchez de
Miguel 2022). In 2022, in a list of 23 major
observatories worldwide, Lick was cited as the most affected astronomical site (Green et al.
2022) in the visible regime.
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND or otherwise raise
legal issues, so no legal response is
warranted. Appreciating the observatory
might be exposed to light from San Jose, the
proposed billboard ordinance only allows two
signs in Gilroy, and would be one of
potentially billions of light sources in the 25-
mile radius around Lick Observatory. Impacts of the billboard ordinance would not
constitute a considerable contribution to a
significant cumulative impact. Also see
Response #A6.
12 Lamentably, this highlights Lick and
surrounding communities (including Gilroy) as
optimal sites for the deeper study of the
established correlation between ALAN and
public health. Every major disease is
associated to some extent with short
sleep/long light. Sleep disorders are now
arguably the most prevalent health concern in
the industrialized world.
This comment is speculative, and therefore it
does not provide substantial evidence of a
significant health impact. See Public
Resources Code, §§ 21080(e) and
21082.2(c). The comment's assumption that
exposure to ALAN causes sleep deprivation
ignores other important confounding variables
such as noise pollution, air pollution,
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 13
19309265.12
lifestyles, and proximity to other carcinogens.
Please see Response #A9.
13 Misapprehension 3: Response to comments on
MND: I2 (p 501 and p 525 of packet) On the
Appellant team’s contention that the following (6 April 2021) comment is incorrect: "The
efficiency of electronic illumination represents a
manyfold increase in wasted light, compared
with former illumination methods. Second, the
nature of LED technology (i.e. combining emission from multiple intensity peaks)
contaminates the entire visible spectrum,
whereas incandescent or discharge (e.g.
sodium) lighting consists of isolated spectral
peaks, with adjacent spectral regions free from
contamination." Rationale: The deployment of ever more (and more efficient) sources of
artificial light, regardless of the technology (e.g.
LED versus chemical discharge versus
incandescent) and regardless of the originating
fixture (electronic billboards versus luminaires) is concerning: all contribute - although some,
like electronic billboards, disproportionately so,
because direction matters (Luginbuhl et al.
2009) - to the phenomenon of ALAN. In large
part, ALAN is a consequence of the physics of
ever-present aerosols (e.g. water vapor,
particles, etc.), which redirect or scatter light.
Billboards intentionally project light laterally.
Additionally, the distance (or path length) the
photons travel from the source plays a role,
such that billboards mounted higher above the ground contaminate more. Furthermore, one of
the more dominant scattering processes,
Rayleigh scattering, exhibits not simply an
additive or multiplicative dependence, but a
power law dependence such that shorter (blue)
wavelengths are more strongly scattered than
longer (red) wavelengths. Compared with
former incandescent illumination, LEDs of any
vintage emit a preponderance of blue light, as
illustrated in by the Appellant team in attachment F. However, note that attachment F
compares 2 types of LED only and excludes
any illustration of incandescent lighting which
would exhibit a vastly suppressed - or even
non-existent blue component. The transition to
The billboard will not disproportionately
contribute to ALAN. The Project's minor
contribution to ALAN is not a significant impact under CEQA. The Project adopts new
technology that reduces horizon light and
skyglow. The billboard will utilize a
combination of (a) long and short louvers, (b)
internally lensed diodes with outputs of 25° down and 20° up and finally (c) the mounting
of the diodes at a 6° downward angle. With
reference to horizon, this results in an overall
output of 31° below and 14° above. This
reduces skyglow by 60% as compared to an
ordinary output of 35° above. The comment here refers to the brightness of a typical LED
floodlight. However, the LEDs used in the
Appellant’s billboards are much less intense
than LED floodlights. Moreover, the makeup
of the Appellant's billboards’ white light is 60% green, 10% blue, and 30% red, and the
billboards’ brightness is dimmed to 3% of its
full level during night time. Accordingly,
during the night blue light (or shorter
wave lengths) makes up only a very small
fraction of transmitted light. Additionally,
substantial evidence shows that digital
billboards are in fact less obtrusive than
traditional displays, as digital billboards have
superior technology that directs light at limited
audiences (here, motorists). By contrast, traditional displays are illuminated by
reflecting light sources of the display's
facings, at levels that are 31 to 212 brighter
than LED bulbs. Ultimately, the LED displays
proposed here will direct light downward at
the nearby highway. The billboards will also
abide by brightness standards that ensure
the sign will cast 0.3 foot candles at 250 feet.
While the sign is visible beyond that distance,
lighting levels beyond 250 feet will generally
not register on a light meter.
The commenter is incorrect in his
assumptions about the purpose and
information in Attachment F. The diagram in
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 14
19309265.12
solid-state LED technology has increased
emissions at visible wavelengths. Estimation of this component suggests that the true overall
increase in radiance in the visible spectrum
may be as high as 270% globally and 400% in
some regions (Sanchez de Miguel et al. 2021)
e,g. predominantly in conurbations of the industrialized world, such as the San Francisco
Bay Area.
Attachment F was created by the Appellant's
lighting expert and compares digital signage and regular LED bulbs. The diagram is clearly
labeled and the commenter misrepresents
the record.
In comparing light sources, the diagram
measures two light sources with a spectroradiometer, a device that measures
both the wavelength and amplitude of the
light emitted from a light source. This diagram
illustrates the principle that billboard lights
transmit less light than LED streetlights and
headlights, which contain a full spectrum
wavelength of multiple colors. Instead, they
use “narrow bandwidth” colors that go up to a
defined point called a “peak wavelength.” As
a result, billboards are less disruptive to light
sensitive uses than standard LEDs.
It also demonstrates that billboards use far
less blue light than a standard LED lightbulb.
The makeup of the Appellant's billboards’
white light is 60% green, 10% blue, and 30%
red, and the billboards’ brightness is dimmed
to 5% of its full level during night time.
Accordingly, during the night, blue light (or
shorter wavelengths) makes up only a very
small fraction of transmitted light. In simple
terms, the billboards use very little blue and only when needed. This again sets the
billboards apart from other LED lighting
technologies. The
Appellant has successfully worked in
collaboration with astronomers, including
representatives from observatories in
Flagstaff, Kitt Peak, Stewart, Large Binocular
Telescope, and the International Dark-Sky
Association to reduce skyglow and focus /
shield light primarily at our intended
audience. In the past, Outfront's operational parameters, such as the directionality of its
LEDs, has satisfied the scientific community.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 15
19309265.12
14 Misapprehension 4: Response to comments on
MND: I2 (p 502 and p 491 of packet) “The project does comply with many of the best
management practices identified in [the
International Dark Sky Association’s, IDA
(2019) Guidance for Electronic Message
Centers] document.” Rationale: The full set of guidelines are designed to work in concert to
mitigate the acceleration of light pollution.
Omitting one recommendation hampers the
efficacy of the others on a selective basis. For
example, in the present case, the project omits
the curfew guideline for turning off signs during
low-traffic periods throughout the small hours
of the morning. The Appellant team offer no
justification for the omission of this guideline.
Elsewhere in their responses, the Appellant
team elect to dismiss the experience of opposition to billboards in the City of San Jose
as “irrelevant”. However, this discounts a
valuable informative, educative – and relevant -
data set, since the City of San Jose experience
remains the most comparable example to the
present project (temporally, demographically
and geographically). It would be foolhardy for
any community in the hinterland of San Jose to
ignore its lessons.
The comment refers to the International Dark-
Sky Association’s (2019) Guidance for Electronic Message Centers and suggests
that the Project has not incorporated best
practices. Guidance from non-regulatory
agencies and extraterritorial jurisdictions is
not binding on the City of Gilroy. Additionally, the Project does in fact comply with many of
the best management practices identified in
this document, and would emit light at one-
sixth the brightness level allowed by State
law. The Project also complies with the best
management practices and standards related
to sensitive area setbacks, size limits, and
density limits. The City has the discretion to
select performance standards and thresholds
of significance.
Additionally, Dr. Lynam reiterates his argument that opinions from anonymous
residents of the City of San Jose related to
their opposition to billboards is relevant in the
determination if a digital billboard in Gilroy will
have a significant environmental effect. This
data is not substantial evidence because it is
unsubstantiated opinion that is not based on
factual foundation of the Project and relates
to different proposals in different
environments. See Pub. Resources Code, §
21080(b)(2).
15 In revising the City of San Jose (2018)
billboard ordinance the curfew guideline was
adopted (and readily accepted by outdoor advertising industry representatives) without
hesitation. Subsequent activity by both Clear
Channel Outdoor and Out Front Media in
response to the San Jose revision is evidence
enough that the adoption of the full set of IDA
guidelines has not deterred outdoor advertisers
from competing for access to electronic
billboards.
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND or otherwise raise
legal issu es, so no legal response is
warranted.
The City of Gilroy has the discretion to limit
the number of signs in its jurisdiction and set
operational parameters. What another cities
decides is not relevant.
16 It is of great concern that the City of Gilroy and
Appellant team appear to be in accord on this
issue. At the very least, it is suggestive of a
lack of understanding and is suggestive of a
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND or otherwise raise
legal issues, so no legal response is
warranted.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 16
19309265.12
laissez-faire - or even permissive – planning
culture.
B Comment Letter Submitted by Santa Clara Valley Audubon Society and Sierra Club
Loma Prieta Chapter on January 18, 2023
For responses to the issues raised in this
letter, please see the September 29, 2022
Response to Comments, Responses #K1 -13 .
C Email from Gene Phillips dated January 18, 2023
As a resident of Gilroy since 1983, I vehemently oppose even the idea of allowing
an electronic billboard being installed
anywhere within the city. I move here to raise
my family with a small town atmosphere in
mind, much like the city of Milpitas in the 50's, 60's and 70's. With the advent of an electronic
billboard, the visual pollution must out weigh
any monetary benefit to the city. Are we that
desperate?? NO!!
This comment does not make claims about the legality of the MND, and so no legal
response is warranted.
D Email from Steph LeMieux dated January 18, 2023
My name is Stephanie LeMieux, and live at
2140 Hollyhock Lane, Gilroy. I vote NO on the
new LED billboard. Having lived in San Jose
most of my life, I've seen billboards like this on
my commute. They represent the worst of
urban blight. People don't live in Gilroy
because they want "big city" life. They live here
because the pace is slower, and the presence
of farmland is refreshing and peaceful. While
growth is inevitable, it doesn't need to look
exactly like other large cities. We can choose
to be different. We can choose to be better.
Don't ruin the landscape of our city.
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND, so no response is
warranted.
For a discussion of the aesthetic impacts of
the Project, please see the September 29,
2022 Response to Comments, Response
#A5. For a discussion of the evidentiary weight of layperson opinions, see Response
#C.
E Email from Alexis Arredondo dated January 18, 2023
1 Please consider saying no to the proposed
billboard off of 101. It doesn't fit with our city
vibes. I am originally from Texas and there are
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND, so no response is
warranted.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 17
19309265.12
billboards all along the highway and it looks
cheap and destroys the natural landscape.
For a discussion of the aesthetic impacts of
the Project, please see the September 29, 2022 Response to Comments, Response
#A5.
2 They are a distraction to already distracted drivers and that endangers everyone who
drives on the 101. I know we need revenue,
but please find something other than this.
For a discussion of the Project's impact on driver distraction, please see the September
29, 2022 Response to Comments, Response
#A10.
F Email from John Franzen dated January 17, 2023
I've seen signs like this on 101. I find them
distracting. They change before I can digest
what the message it. I've made it habit to note their presence and then ignore them. Please
do not change our current sign laws to allow
this to be built.
For a discussion of the Project's impact on
driver distraction, please see the September
29, 2022 Response to Comments, Response
#A10.
G Email from Jack Nogosek dated January 17, 2023
Hello, and good morning! I am a resident of
Gilroy, and I just learned about a proposal for consideration to install/erect an extremely
large, digital/electronic advertising billboard
somewhere off Highway 101. Or if that is not
the case, the consideration of changing zoning
and/or ordinance laws to allow for such signs. I
respectfully request that the City of Gilroy votes NO, on these electronic billboards and/or any
changes to allow for such signs.
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND, so no response is
warranted.
H Email from Lisa Pickrel dated January 18, 2023
To Whom It May Concern, I am a long time
resident of over 40 years. I have seen some
good improvements to Gilroy with shopping options like Target, the Outlets and the Eagle
Ridge community which compliments the
existing landscape. Additionally there were
improvements to Gilroy with the addition of
grocery options like Costco, Safeway and
NobHill. However, I think the new proposal of a
7 story electronic sign in a scenic, bedroom
community, is a VERY poor choice and takes
away from the beauty and small town
atmosphere you are selling to people who look
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND, so no response is
warranted.
For a discussion of the aesthetic impacts of
the Project, please see the September 29,
2022 Response to Comments, Response
#A5.
Additionally, economic impacts are not
significant environmental impacts under
CEQA. 14 Cal. Code Regs. §15131.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 18
19309265.12
to move here. That type of sign belongs in
industrial and large cities not rural areas.
Please reconsider this project and reject the
income opportunity that so often takes
precedence in your office at th expense of
residents. Examples of this would include large
transition housing developments (adding to crime and the already higher than average
homeless population), putting up large low
income apartments on 1 street instead of
shopping and restaurant options which would
have improved residents lives. Now with the
other high density housing planned for prime
real estate on first street, when will it end? Are
you guys trying to ruin this town?
This sign will be just one more thing to make
Gilroy feel ghetto, which is how this town is
now being described, by those who have lived here long enough to know the difference. I urge
you to start caring about the people who live
here and not just the bottom line.
I Email from John Miller dated January 15, 2023
1 The General Plan 2040 specifically prohibits off
premise advertising so what is the justification for not following the General Plan? Can one
Appellant advocate for a proposal such as
allowing digital billboards and on the basis of
that advocacy convince the city to simply
ignore its own General Plan? What then was
the point of establishing a General Plan if it is so easy to ignore it? Secondly, no members of
the public have undertaken an effort to allow
this. Something as intrusive as digital
billboards cannot be justified in the absence of
clear community support.
This comment misstates the 2040 General
Plan. The 2040 General Plan does not prohibit off-premise advertising. While the
existing sign ordinance does not allow off-site
advertise, the Project changes this ordinance
with a zoning text amendment. The zoning
text amendment has the effect of allowing
electronic billboards to be located on-site or off-site on private or public property,
designated on the General Plan Land Use
Diagram as General Services Commercial or
City Gateway District. The Appellant, in its
February 17, 2023 Appeal of the Planning Commiss ions February 2, 2023 action,
addressed the Project's consistent with the
City's General Plan in detail, and this
consistency analysis is incorporated herein
by this reference.
(Additionally, in a January 18, 2023 email, the
same commenter acknowledges that the
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 19
19309265.12
General Plan does not specifically prohibit off
premise advertising.)
An MND Is only required to discuss
inconsistencies with the General Plan. 14
CCR §15125. Section 15125(d) does not
require an EIR to explain why the project is
consistent with applicable plans or to provide support for a conclusion where there are no
plan inconsistencies. North Coast Rivers
Alliance v. Marin Mun. Water Dist. (2013) 216
Cal.App.4th 614.
As explained in the MND, the Project is
consistent with the 2040 General Plan. The
MND evaluated the Project's compliance with
the General Plan, including the policies to
reduce impacts on scenic resources and to
preserve views within the City, and
determined that the permitted locations set forth by the proposed Ordinance would not
conflict with these policies. (MND, p. 20.)
2 The Appellant behind this scheme is a landowner who is looking for a revenue stream
from Outfront Media, a billboard company
which will generate revenue by selling
advertising of products and services not
available at the location of the sign. This is the
very definition of off premise advertising
currently prohibited. Understand that the
majority of off premise advertising is for
national consumer product and service
companies such as McDonalds, Verizon,
Citibank, etc. not for local businesses.
The comment is inaccurate. In fact, the evidence in the record demonstrates that
local businesses are more likely to use the
digital advertising space than national
companies, and Bay Area and nationwide
statistics have shown that local business
represent approximately 70% of advertising
industry revenues. (See February 2, 2023
Letter re Potential Benefits of Digital
Billboards to the City of Gilroy’s Economy.)
3 Furthermore the city has relied on a CEQA
environmental review of the proposed
billboards and then declared a Mitigated Negative Declaration and uses that as an
excuse to dismiss any and all comments
expressing opposition to this scheme. CEQA
environmental reviews, which seem to be
designed to evaluate ecological impacts of
proposed development, do not adequately
address the issues raised by off premise
advertising which include aesthetic degradation
and the deterioration of the community’s
CEQA serves the purpose of requiring a
public agency to review the environmental
impacts of a project, and to respond to public comments on the project. Contrary to the
commenter's statement, CEQA does require
evaluation of the Project's impact on
aesthetics and architectural resources. To
this end, the MND appropriately evaluated
the Project's impact on these resource areas.
To the extent that the public comments on
issues outside of the scope of CEQA, the City
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 20
19309265.12
architectural integrity, by among other impacts,
subjecting tax payers to unsolicited commercial advertising for which there is no off switch. Nor
does CEQA address the fact that the value of
off premise advertising is a function of that
advertising’s exposure to the publicly financed
right of way the maintenance of which is not supported by user fees paid by either the
billboard company or property owner leasing
land to the billboard company. Using an
inadequate CEQA tool and then claiming the
city has adequately analyzed this proposal is
misleading and does not serve the best interest
of the people of Gilroy.
In addition, a 500 plus page “information
packet” (with inadequate page numbering and
table of contents) compiled by the city to
evaluate a proposal to allow two digital billboards is not helpful to achieving public
understanding. Rather, the city is burying the
truth of the matter in needless verbage,
drowning the public in irrelevant material to
discourage people from easily grasping the
reality of the situation. And what is the dollar
amount of staff and consultants’ time spent on
preparing such extensive but needless
documentation? Has the city staff nothing else
to do?
The question is simple. Why is the city
spending staff time greasing the skids for a
scheme to introduce off premise advertising
into a community that has historically and
repeatedly opposed doing so? I look forward to
a response.
can certainly consider these comments when
making its decision on whether to approve the Project. However, comments outside the
scope of CEQA would not provide grounds to
invalidate the MND.
With respect to public benefits associate with
a particular sign, the City would receive a direct public benefit through community
benefit payments under a development
agreement. It also could expect to receive
millions of dollars in tax benefits insofar as
the local business community saw increased
sales. The magnitude of these economic
impacts is set forth in the Appellant's
February 2, 2023 letter to the Planning
Commission, entitled "Letter re Potential
Benefits of Digital Billboards to the City of
Gilroy’s Economy," incorporated herein.
J Email from Shirley Willard dated January 19, 2023
Please vote NO on this proposal for 2 new
billboards for Gilroy, CA. This is not what we
are about or need to be about. Absolutely
ridiculous! I feel that the billboard project would
appear to be so cheap looking, though so very
expensive, not classy or just plain vulgar for
our community. They are too big, too tall, too
bright, not wanted, and a very poor
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND or otherwise raise
legal issues, so no legal response is
warranted. Additionally, this lay testimony
does not provide evidence that the Project
will have a significant impact on the
environment.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 21
19309265.12
representation of Gilroy. Thank you for your
thoughtful consideration and your time.
K Email from Dashiell Leeds, Sierra Club Loma Prieta Chapter and Shani Kleinhaus, Santa
Clara Valley Audubon Society dated January 19, 2023
1 My name is Dashiell Leeds and I’m the
Conservation Organizer for the Sierra Club Loma Prieta Chapter, representing both the
Sierra Club and the Santa Clara Valley
Audubon Society in this comment. Both of our
organizations expressed serious concerns
about the electronic billboard project and
provided comments on the initial draft
study/MND. Our previous letters are attached.
Please do not increase light pollution in our
community and ecosystems. We ask the
Planning Commission to recommend that the
City Council should not adopt the MND. We also ask the Commission not to adopt the
resolution outlined in the staff report.
For a response to the Sierra Club and
Audubon Society's prior comment letters, please see the September 29, 2022
Response to Comments, Response #K.
2 We would like to highlight that the Biological Report underestimates the potential impact to
ecosystems including those non-special status
species that may make use of the adjacent
Princevalle drainage that benefit from its water
and relative cover and including those that may
transit it between the larger habitats of Uvas
Creek and Llagas Creek. Recent scientific
studies highlight the pervasive, cumulative, and
harmful impacts of artificial light at night to
terrestrial and aquatic organisms, species, and
ecosystems. The impacts, including effects on circadian rhythms, metabolism and behavior in
fish, birds, insects, and other taxa, have been
summarized in several recent publications in
major scientific journals.
For a discussion of the impacts of the Project on biological resources, please see the
September 29, 2022 Response to
Comments, Responses #A9 and K6.
3 Humans also suffer from hormone disruption
and increased rates of cancer when their
circadian rhythms are disrupted.
For a discussion of the health impacts of the
Project, please see Response #A9 above.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 22
19309265.12
L Email from LISA DICKNSON dated January 26, 2023
We Don’t Need these big city flashy huge signs
telling people to stop in Gilroy. Our small town
appeal is what people appreciate about our
sweet town. Let it be. vote NO on the huge
flashing sign.
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND or otherwise raise
legal issues, so no legal response is
warranted.
M Email from Robert Weaver dated January 26, 2023
1 Paula and I attended the most recent Planning
commission meeting to give new
Commissioner Kelly Ramirez a welcoming
audience. The topic of the sign ordnance was
not our motivation. The discussion of the topic
however, prompted me to these comments.
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND or otherwise raise
legal issues, so no legal response is
warranted.
2 1. While LED lighting can appear as different
colors, its inherent basic underlying color is blue. Blue light is stimulating to our brains, and
should be thought of as “visual caffeine”. While
this is of little concern to the passing motorist
with a brief exposure, it is of great concern to
people in its visual proximity who are exposed
for long periods of time. Why does the X-ray
technician go behind a lead wall while you get
X-rayed; short term, no problem, all day, a
cumulative issue.
Refer to footnote 1.
Refer to footnote 2.
Footnote 1. This is the way they are
constructed. They are really blue LEDs with
phosphor to convert some of the blue light to
green and red. These are usually designed to
mimic daylight or tungsten bulbs, or something
in between.
The daylight ones will have a spectrum that
looks a bit like this:
As discussed in Responses #A9, 12, the
billboards utilize very little blue light and only
when it is needed.
First, the commenter acknowledges that there
is little concern of lighting impacts on passing
motorists. The Appellant agrees. We also
wish to point out that there are no residential
receptors who will be exposed to the light
from the digital sign the Appellant has
proposed (and which will be considered
separately should the City Council approve
the proposed billboard ordinance). The
Project MND and other information in the administrative record demonstrate there are
no sensitive receptors in the vicinity of this
location.
The diagram in this comment illustrates how
“white” LEDs are made. The color of the LED
is created by the chemistry made of the
internal PN (Positive / Negative) junctions of
the diode. This is an example of how cities
put up “white” LED streetlights that saturate
blue output. This is not how the light for the electronic billboards are designed. They do
not use phosphorus. Instead, the billboards
use peak wavelength diodes that emit only
the core primary color.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 23
19309265.12
Footnote 2.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biological_effects_
of_high-energy_visible_light
For a discussion of the Project's health
impacts, see Response #A9 .
A general Wikipedia article regarding the
general health impacts of blue LED light is
not substantial evidence of a significant
impact. Not only is Wikipedia an unreliable
source, Mr. Weaver is not a medical expert, and the practice of pulling random pieces of
information from the internet, without passing
it through any sort of filter of expertise, does
not amount to substantial evidence.
3 2. Growing up in Stockton, I would watch the
sun set behind Mt. Diablo, which appeared as
a big mountain relative to the rest of the range.
In fact, Mt. Diablo is not that big, and only
stands out because it is so much taller than the surrounding hills, and has only flat farm land
between Stockton and itself. This sign
ordnance, as proposed, would allow an electric
sign to be 75 feet above grade, the height of a
7 story building. Gilroy is mostly flat farm land
and a 7 story electric sign would loom mightily,
and could possibly even be seen in Hollister. In
Gilroy, those who live on hillsides with a valley
view, will be getting an eyeful.
For a discussion of the impacts of the Project
on the scenic resources of Gilroy, please see
the September 29, 2022 Response to
Comments, Response #A5.
We note that, if the City approves the proposed billboard ordinance, the Appellant
would, under a separate approval process,
seek the City's approval of a 65-foot sign,
which would be consistent with the height of
other lights and signage in the vicinity of the
Proposed Sign Location.
4 3. A major concern for astronomers is light
pollution and sky glow. When Lick Observatory
was established, these things were not an
issue. Today, the sky glow from the south bay
is an issue. Certain frequencies of light also interfere with their work. Refer to footnote 3.
Refer to footnote 4.
Footnote 3.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lick_Observatory
Footnote 4 With the growth of San Jose, and
the rest of Silicon Valley, light pollution became
a problem for the observatory. In the 1970's, a
site in the Santa Lucia Mountains at Junipero
Serra Peak, southeast of Monterey, was
evaluated for possible relocation of many of the telescopes. [citation needed] However, funding
for the move was not available, and in 1980
San Jose began a program to reduce the
For a discussion of the impacts of the Project
on Lick Observatory, see Responses #A1, 2,
10, and 13.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 24
19309265.12
effects of lighting, most notaby replacing all
streetlamps with low pressure sodium lamps. The result is that the Mount Hamilton site
remains a viable location for a major working
[sic]
5 4. This ordnance change request has caused a
focus on the current proponent. Any change to
the current ordnance is a gateway for whatever
signage that comes along in the future. If we
change this ordnance, it will be difficult to deny future signs that comply. We are Gilroy, we
know who we are and what we are. We have a
sense of place that keeps us here, and for
some, is the very reason why we are here.
Signage as proposed in the ordnance change,
will not harmonize with our bucolic and rural nature. To approve this ordnance change, will
allow the camels nose under the tent.
The Project does not set a precedent for any
other signs. The new Electronic Billboard
Ordinance amends the existing sign
ordinance to allow up to two electronic
billboards in the City. At this time, only one electronic billboard application has been
submitted. The subsequent application for the
second electronic billboard would require
separate environmental review.
Additionally, the City would have the police
power to enact and enforce its limitation on the number of billboards in the City, and any
billboard companies that want to erect a third
billboard within the City would have no legal
basis to challenge the City’s ordinance or the
City’s authority to enforce it. The idea that no public agency can put a limit on billboards is
a fallacy; even state law puts a "freeze" on
the number of billboards in certain parts of
the state. (See, e.g., City of Santa Clara
Municipal Code § 18.80.220(a); Cal. Bus. &
Prof. Code § 5443).
N Email from Laurel Lindner dated January 16, 2023
A giant electronic sign along one01 in Gilroy is
a terrible idea and will be an eyesore. It’s not
something we need, and hope you will
definitely reconsider!
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND or otherwise raise
legal issues, so no legal response is
warranted.
O Email from Tess Reed dated January 16, 2023
Hello, From a pleading homeowner, this will be
a site for sore eyes in our city. Please vote No!
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND or otherwise raise
legal issues, so no legal response is
warranted.
P Email from Salazar, Salvador dated January 16, 2023
Morning To whom It may concern, but I am
against a “Giant Electronic Billboard in Gilroy”
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND or otherwise raise
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 25
19309265.12
This just takes away from its community. Does
Los Gatos, Willow Glen, Morgan Hill have one that looks appealing?... NO. What it does need
is Downtown Gilroy upgraded, but also keep
original.
And if revenue is the issue, start by having a
traffic unit for commuters cutting through town and locals speeding and not following traffic
signs.
legal issues, so no legal response is
warranted.
Q Email from Judith Ames dated January 16, 2023
Please do not allow billboards to be put up in
Gilroy. We already have a poor reputation for
visitors, let’s not make it worse. VOTE NO
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND or otherwise raise
legal issues, so no legal response is
warranted.
R Email from Genevieve Corbin dated January 15, 2023
Do we really need something so obtrusive in
our country atmosphere
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND or otherwise raise
legal issues, so no legal response is
warranted.
S Email from Jennifer Thomson dated January 15, 2023
To the Planning Dept - As a member of the
Gilroy community, I am asking you NOT to
consider or allow a giant lighted billboard. I
think street lights should be considered as our
town is too dark at night, making addresses
harder to read. Gilroy is not the place for giant
lighted billboards. I think it is a bad idea, it would look tacky and they are much too bright.
The smaller ones they have in San Jose are
too bright - whoever came up with this idea, it
is absurd. Please strick down this idea. I do not
want to see this type of advertisement looming
over our town. I say NO to a giant billboard!!
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND or otherwise raise
legal issues, so no legal response is
warranted.
For a discussion of the aesthetics impacts of
the Project, please see the September 29,
2022 Response to Comments, Response #A5. Please note that the Appellant's
Proposed Sign Location, which would be
considered separately, is situated in a
commercial area and would be compatible
with surrounding uses, as indicated in the
MND.
For a discussion of the light impacts of the
Project, please see Response #A10.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 26
19309265.12
T Email from ldgolding@aol.com dated January 16, 2023
Is this a joke? A sign like this has no place in
Gilroy. Bad enough we have the 3 story
apartment building, Alexander Pl. right next to
the train tracks reflecting noise. We don't need this kind of light pollution. If you want this, put it
in your yard facing into your bedroom window.
-----Original Message----- From: Your Hidden
Glen neighbors
<reply@rs.email.nextdoor.com> To: ldgolding@aol.com Sent: Mon, Jan 16, 2023
1:31 pm Subject: Giant Electronic Billboard in
Gilroy? With 2 blazing screens (each the size
of a small apartment at 672 square feet),
looming 7-stories (75 ft) in the air, off of...
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND or otherwise raise
legal issues, so no legal response is
warranted.
U Email from Chrys Diskowski, dated January 19, 2023
1 Dear Members of the Gilroy Planning
Commission, I am heartily in favor of our car
dealerships thriving. But not at the expense
and assault on our eyeballs and view shed that
behemoth electronic billboards would bring:
with faces as big as a small apartment, flashing
and looming 7-stories high in the sky, they
would likely be the most prominent structures
in all of south county, visible possibly from across town, in addition to northbound and
southbound travelers on 101; AND, a terrible
first impression of Gilroy.
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND, so no response is
warranted.
For a discussion of the aesthetic impacts of
the Project, please see the September 29,
2022 Response to Comments, Response
#A5.
2 One nice advantage to the more modern internet media for advertising, is the electronic
glare is blissfully limited to the pixel size of our
smartphones and digital screens in our private
homes. I would encourage businesses who
would advertise on the billboards to thoroughly
explore internet options, as a favor to the
residents and smaller businesses of Gilroy,
who they share an environment with.
Gilroy is also blossoming as an agritourism,
cycling and family recreation destination. Car dealerships are not the only gig here. Let’s not
disturb that momentum by allowing digital
billboards that will make many potential visitors
The comment does not question the content or conclusions of the MND or otherwise raise
legal issues, so no legal response is
warranted.
We note that the Appellant's Proposed Sign
Location is located in an urbanized
commercial area replete with other light
sources, and it is not out of character with
surrounding uses.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 27
19309265.12
say, ‘no thank you’. Blighting our major
gateway at the highways, when we are working to beautify other gateways such as the
Monterey / Leavesley, makes absolutely no
sense at all. We want visitors to stay awhile,
explore all we have to offer (which is improving
continuously) fill up local lodging—collect that 11.5% TOT—not just leave for home after
buying a car. Many of the people who live here
enjoy the quiet small-town appeal, surrounded
by a beautiful greenbelt of our natural and
agricultural lands. Electronic billboards are not
“on-brand” for Gilroy. They do not harmonize
with our small town and pastoral charm. Gilroy
is not poised to become like Las Vegas.
Adding digital billboards to our environment is
glaringly worse than pairing wingtip shoes with
shorts, and will confuse the target audience of visitors we are trying to lure to stay a while. Are
digital billboards a first impression of Gilroy, we
really want travelers to have of us?
Do we as a community really want to live in
both the glare and shadow 24/7/365, subjected
to the business dealings of a massive NYC
corporation who would build and own the
billboard, and also book the ads? Let’s stick
with the sensible sign ordinance Gilroy
currently has, and say “no thank you” to Outfront Media and their proposal to mess with
our town’s codes, General Plan and aesthetic.
Beautiful small towns that people flock to, like
Monterey, Carmel, San Luis Obispo, do not
have these monsters. Thank you for your
attention and consideration of this important
planning decision. Your community is counting
on you.
V Email from Ann Marie McCauley, dated January 15, 2023
Dear City Officials, While I am not directly
opposed to this sign, I would like to know how
you will deal with the other business owners
who, in the past, were denied larger and taller
signs. Approving this will set a new precedent
for signs in Gilroy. Would it require changing
the existing regulations for all signs? Will the
The Project does not set a precedent for any
other signs. A city is permitted to regulate
different types of signs under its police
powers. The new Electronic Billboard
Ordinance amends the existing sign
ordinance to allow up to two electronic
billboards in the City, and it can differentiate
between billboards along highways and other
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 28
19309265.12
business owners rejected in the past now be
allowed to increase their sign size?
signs because outdoor advertising is different
from on-premise signage in a variety of ways. Dozens of local governments, and even the
State of California, has different rules for
these two different types of advertising signs.
At this time, only one electronic billboard
application has been submitted. The subsequent application for the second
electronic billboard would require separate
environmental review.
W Email from Ed Merrell, dated January 19, 2023
I do not support any modifications to Gilroy's
sign ordinance that would permit the proposed
80-foot high, 30-by-22.5- foot LED billboard
sign. This type of sign will have a significant
effect on Gilroy. It will distract drivers and it will
impact the beautiful views of our surrounding
hills. Please vote no on any modifications of
Gilroy's sign ordinance.
For a discussion of the impacts of the Project
on driver safety, please see the September
29, 2022 Response to Comments, Response
#A10.
The remainder of the comment does not
question the content or conclusions of the
MND or otherwise raise legal issues, so no
legal response is warranted.
To correct one fact, the billboard ordinance
allows 75-foot signs, not 80-foot signs. The
Appellant's proposed sign (which would be
considered separately if the ordinance
change is made) would be 65 feet tall.
X Email from Anne -Marie Hamilton, dated January 19, 2023
Dear Gilroy Planning Division, I’m writing to let the Planning Division know that as a Gilroy
resident and homeowner I am against the two
large billboards proposed for downtown Gilroy.
I feel they would be not only be ugly and garish
but also a dangerous distraction for passing
motorists. If you have any questions or
concerns please do not hesitate to let me
know. Thank you very much.
For a discussion of the impacts of the Project on driver safety, please see the September
29, 2022 Response to Comments, Response
#A10.
The remainder of The comment does not
question the content or conclusions of the
MND or otherwise raise legal issues, so no
legal response is warranted.
Y Email from Lee C. Spieller, dated January 16, 2023
I want it noted that I am against the proposal of
installing giant screens for advertising in Gilroy
as a resident.
This comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND, so no legal
response is warranted.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 29
19309265.12
Z Email from Debbie Wilkey, dated January 16, 2023
NO Please No This comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND, so no legal
response is warranted.
AA Email from Sandy Hanes, dated January 16, 2023
Please do not approve electronic billboards in
our city
This comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND, so no legal
response is warranted.
AB Email from Alexis Arredondo, dated January 18, 2023
1 Please consider saying no to the proposed
billboard off of 101. It doesn't fit with our city
vibes. I am originally from Texas and there are
billboards all along the highway and it looks
cheap and destroys the natural landscape.
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND, so no legal
response is warranted.
For a discussion of the aesthetic impacts of the Project, please see the September 29,
2022 Response to Comments, Response
#A5.
2 They are a distraction to already distracted
drivers and that endangers everyone who
drives on the 101. I know we need revenue,
but please find something other than this.
For a discussion of the impacts of the Project
on driver safety, please see the September
29, 2022 Response to Comments, Response
#A10.
AC Email from Gene Phillips, dated January 18, 2023
As a resident of Gilroy since 1983, I
vehemently oppose even the idea of allowing an electronic billboard being installed
anywhere within the city. I move here to raise
my family with a small town atmosphere in
mind, much like the city of Milpitas in the 50's,
60's and 70's. With the advent of an electronic
billboard, the visual pollution must out weigh
any monetary benefit to the city. Are we that
desperate?? NO!!
For a discussion of the aesthetic impacts of
the Project, please see the September 29, 2022 Response to Comments, Response
#A5.
AD Email from John Miller, dated January 18, 2023
Dear Commissioners, I am submitting a
correction to my email of January 15 opposing
the proposal to allow off premise billboards in Gilroy. The General Plan does not specifically
prohibit off premise advertising. But In the GP
As discussed in Response #I, the Project
does not violate the General Plan. The
Project adopts a new Electronic Billboard Ordinance and amends the existing Sign
Ordinance, including Section 30.37.30.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 30
19309265.12
under Land Use 8.7 Signs & Billboards, it says
among other things, “enforce sign regulations.” I assume that is a reference to ARTICLE
XXXVII. SIGN REGULATIONS. In Section
30.37.30 number 16 prohibits: Any off-site
advertising sign, including billboards, in any
district except as exempted in section 30.37.90.” Section 30.37.90 exempts
temporary real estate and A frame sidewalk
signs from those signs prohibited under
Section 30.37.3. I think it is safe to say that the
General Plan implies, that to achieve the Plan’s
stated objectives, enforcement of the existing
Sign Regulations is necessary and proper.
According to this comment, because the
General Plan references "sign regulations," the City cannot amend the sign regulations
without violating the General Plan. That
interpretation goes far beyond a reasonable
interpretation of the General Plan; the
provision cited merely requires the City to dutifully enforce the regulations the City
adopts. It is appropriate for the City to amend
its sign regulations in a way that is consistent
with reasoned decisionmaking that can
include change. Evolution is the sign of
healthy government.
AE Email from Susan Gamm, dated January 28, 2023
Please do not. Hangs the sign ordinance.
/ / /
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND, so no legal
response is warranted.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 31
19309265.12
AF Email from Linda Clark, dated January 27, 2023
I am writing with the hope that you will consider
denying the Mitigated Negative Declaration
with regard to changes in the ordinance which
would allow an electronic billboard to be erected in Gilroy. As you know, Gilroy is a
special place and adding a billboard to its
environment would only allow it to become like
any other big city. I have lived in Gilroy for ten
years and have come to love this community. I love the agricultural fields that surround us,
giving our town the country feel that most of its
residents have come to enjoy and most visitors
comment on. Driving past Auto Row is not one
of my favorite places to pass, but by erecting a
billboard in its vicinity will only make it that much more undesirable. Flashing lights that
advertise cars, food, or whatever is not my idea
of giving people any idea of the kind of city that
Gilroy has become over the years.. As it is,
Gilroy is growing in leaps and bounds. Ask yourself, what real benefit would a huge
electronic billboard really add to Gilroy's
attraction? Billboards wouldn't contribute to our
tourism. It's Gilroy Gardens, the wineries, the
hiking trails, and so much more. Please do not
support changing the ordinance which would
allow this type of signage. It adds nothing to
the beauty of our town, and that is what we
should be protecting.
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND, so no legal
response is warranted. As a matter of factual
correction, the proposed ordinance amendment disallows flashing signs (and
such are prohibited too by state law). (Cal.
Bus. & Profs. Code §§ 5403, 5405.)
For a discussion of the aesthetics impacts of
the Project, please see the September 29, 2022 Response to Comments, Response
#A5.
AG Email from Penny Noel, dated January 30, 2023
PLEASE , no electronic billboards in Gilroy.
They distract already distracted drivers and
they harm wildlife and people with disabilities
For a discussion of the impacts of the Project
on driver safety, please see the September 29, 2022 Response to Comments, Response
#A10.
For a discussion of the impacts of the Project
on wildlife, please see the September 29,
2022 Response to Comments, Response
#A9 and G2.
This comment does not explain how the
Project would impact people with disabilities,
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 32
19309265.12
and there is no evidence that the Project
would harm people with disabilities.
AH Email from Robert Weaver, dated January 27, 2023
1 Planning Commissioners, By design, a
community's General Plan is just that, general.
It is not overly specific, but stating its future
goals in generalities. The General Plan is a
community's “dream sheet” for its future development. Many goals are included, but
because of its general wording, those goals are
often in conflict, as we find with the proposed
Electric Sign Ordnance. When a proposal such
as the Electric Sign Ordnance contains
conflicting General Plan goals, it should be
treated in a fair and sensitive manner.
Appearances are, that without sufficient public
discourse, some General Plan goals and
objectives have been discounted in favor of
others. I base this observation on the number of public comments opposing this measure
versus those supporting, and it is not just about
the numbers of comments, but the who. By the
wording of the Electric Sign Ordnance staff
report, staff has become an advocate in this
matter.
For a discussion of the Project's compliance
with t he General Plan, please see Response
#I.
2 While it has been over two decades since I sat
on the Mountain View Planning Commission,
and perhaps things have changed since then, I
cannot recall ever being put in the position of
having to pass a proposal under duress(1).
Regarding the proposed changes in Gilroy’s
Electronic Sign Ordnance, the staff's wording
demands that you delineate cause to justify a denial on this proposal. The burden has always
been on the proponent, to bring forth an
acceptable proposal for consideration. To
place the burden on the Planning Commission,
to justify a denial, runs contrary to accepted practice. Staff reports should not be
authoritarian, dictatorial or biased, but present
the issue fairly without fear or favor. (2)
1. If the Planning Commission recommends
denial, the Commission shall recite the specific
facts and evidential reasons why the
The Planning Commission staff report uses
standard language stating the Planning
Commission may recommend approval or
denial of the ordinance amendment. It is not
improper to require the Planning Commission
to provide specific facts and evidentiary
reasons why the Ordinance and text
amendments to do not carry out the general purposes of the Zoning Ordinance and the
General Plan.
This requirement comes directly from
Government Code section 65855: "After the
hearing, the planning commission shall render its decision in the form of a written
recommendation to the legislative body. Such
recommendation shall include the reasons for
the recommendation, the relationship of the
proposed ordinance or amendment to
applicable general and specific plans, and
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 33
19309265.12
Ordinance and text amendments do not carry
out the general purposes of the Zoning
Ordinance and the General Plan.
2. Pursuant to City Code Section 30.52.40, the
Planning commission may recommend
approval, or deny or deny without prejudice the
requested ordinance amendment.
shall be transmitted to the legislative body in
such form and manner as may be specified
by the legislative body."
3 Staff’s due diligence on this Electronic Sign
ordnance clearly shows to me that their
threshold of compliance with the directives of the City of Gilroy’s 2040 General Plan, while
well intended, are selective and not in line with,
and set to a different level than, those of the
general public in this matter. There were
several parts of the 2040 General Plan
mentioned in the Negative Declaration that were downplayed, and several that were
favored. This was done, seemingly in the effort
to justify this new Electronic Sign Ordnance. As
is the nature of a broad document, several of
the goals of the 2040 General Plan are conflicting. Staff has apparently exercised
great prerogative in weighing the 2040 General
Plan’s elements when considering this
ordnance for approval.
For a discussion of the Project's compliance
with the General Plan, please see Response
#I and see the February 17, 2023 Appeal of Planning Commission’s February 2, 2023
Denial of Ordinance Change, pp. 14-22.
4 At the prior meeting, when one commissioner
asked environmental questions regarding the
sign’s brightness, she was beset with technical
obfuscation (6). Another commissioner asked if
the average Gilroy small business would be
able to afford space on the electric sign, there
was no clear answer regarding affordability,
which equates to opportunity(3). Many
members of the public, spoke or wrote about
their environmental concerns regarding this electronic sign ordnance (7). All of these
concerns are part of the 2040 General Plan
directives. The proponents are being very
vague on important key issues, and it is not
clear to what extent small businesses could
avail themselves of the signage. That
uncertainty in itself, should arouse suspicion,
and give the commission sufficient grounds for
denial, or denial without prejudice (2).
The issue of the impact of the sign's
brightness on the environment necessarily
involves technical expertise. However, a
layperson's explanation of the environmental
impacts of the Project's brightness has been
provided to the City, for example, in the
September 29, 2022 Response to
Comments, Response #K7.
The Appellant provided a letter on February
2, 2023 explaining how local businesses would benefit from the Project. There is
evidence that local businesses will use the
electronic billboard based on nationwide
statistics that show that local business
represent approximately 70% of advertising
industry revenues. (See February 2, 2023
Letter re Potential Benefits of Digital
Billboards to the City of Gilroy’s Economy.)
In fact, small and local businesses, including
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 34
19309265.12
3. Economic Prosperity Goal EP 3: Maintain a supportive business climate that increases the
City’s ability to support expansion of existing
businesses and attraction of new businesses.
The proposed electronic billboard ordinance
provides existing and future businesses in the City an opportunity to advertise and potentially
expand their business. The ordinance provides
Gilroy businesses an opportunity to advertise
their goods and services to visitors and the
local workforce, who may not reside in Gilroy
but drive to Gilroy for employment at local
businesses including retail establishments,
restaurants, and offices, as well as schools and
service organizations.
6. 2040 General Plan: The Gilroy 2040 General
Plan was adopted in November 2020 and has the following policies related to billboards and
freeway signage. While the policies do not
directly address digital media, the policies do
permit freeway signage and billboards, so long
as such signage has minimal negative impact
on the visual environment.
7. RECOMMENDATION: Staff has analyzed
the proposed project, and recommends that
the Planning Commission: a) Recommend that
the City Council adopt the Mitigated Negative Declaration (MND) and find that: the MND was
completed in compliance with the California
Environmental Quality Act (CEQA); there is no
substantial evidence that the project will have a
significant effect on the environment; and the
MND reflects the City’s independent judgment
and analysis; and b) Adopt a resolution
recommending that the City Council adopt an
ordinance (Z 18- 04), approving changes to
Section 30.37.30 (Prohibited Signs), Section
30.37.50 (Commercial and Industrial Districts), and Section 30.37.51 (Freeway Oriented
Signs) and creating a new Zoning Ordinance
Article LV (Electronic Billboards).
travel-related businesses such as hotels,
restaurants, gas stations, and businesses related to entertainment and tourism, are
more reliant on billboards than other types of
businesses due to the need to direct
motorists to their location. Furthermore,
billboards provide a much more affordable advertising platform than other conventional
and modern platforms.
The Appellant has not been vague in
responding to important issues. Rather, the
Appellant has provided detailed, clear
responses. However, uncertainty regarding
the extent that small businesses could utilize
the sign is not sufficient grounds to deny the
Project.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 35
19309265.12
5 By far, the most important and overriding
question the Planning Commission should be considering in this matter is: Cui Bono, Latin for
who benefits. Ask yourself, does it appear that
the small businesses in Gilroy will directly
benefit? Does it appear that the general
population of Gilroy will see any benefit? Will this kind of sign fit in with the general spirit and
feel of Gilroy?(4)(5) Has this proposal been
fairly evaluated by staff for 2040 compliance?
4. Land Use Goal LU 8: Support growth and
development that preserves and strengthens
the City’s historic, small-town character;
provides and maintains safe, livable, and
affordable neighborhoods; and creates
beautiful places.
5, Encourage the growth and development of
retail, office, service, and entertainment uses in Gilroy to provide jobs, support City services,
and make Gilroy an attractive place to live.
For a discussion of the Project's benefits to
local and small businesses, see Response #AH4. Please also see the Appellant's letter
to the Planning Commission, describing
public benefits, including millions of dollars in
sales tax revenues for the City based on
mi llions of dollars in new revenues for Gilroy
businesses.
For a discussion of the Project's compliance
with the General Plan, please see Response
#I and see the February 17, 2023 Appeal of
Planning Commission’s February 2, 2023
Denial of Ordinance Change, p p. 14-22.
It appears to me that the big economic winners in this matter will not be the many small
businesses and people of Gilroy, but the
proponents of this proposal. Shakespeare once
penned: "What is a city if not the people?" For
this ordnance, let us not adopt in haste, and
repent at leisure.
For a discussion of the Project's benefits to local and small businesses, see Response
#AH4.
AI Email from Libba Basile, dated January 29, 2023
I vote a big no on the digital billboard. I’d rather
they bring back the Casa de Fruta billboard
with the man flipping the cup before that
horrible digital billboard, and that’s probably
aging me for people that haven’t lived here for 40 years. I just don’t think we need that
billboard.
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND, so no legal
response is warranted.
AJ Email from James Rogers , dated January 29, 2023
1 Dear Commissioners, I’m writing to urge you to
NOT APPROVE the Mitigated Negative
Declaration for the Initial Study regarding
changes in our sign ordinance. I urge this because I believe that the effects of changing
This is a general comment, and the
comme nter's grounds for stating that the
Project's impacts cannot be mitigated to a
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 36
19309265.12
our ordinance WILL be significant and cannot
be mitigated to a level of insignificance. Here
are my reasons:
level of insignificance are addressed
individually below.
Generally, the MND fully analyzes and
mitigated the Project's impacts to the
environment. There will be no unmitigated
significant impacts, and as a result, an MND
is the appropriate form of environmental
review. (MND, p. 108.)
2 Aesthetics - A sign of 75 or 80 feet tall and 30’
x 22.5’ in area will definitely be visible from our southern gateway at quite a distance. It may
only be legible at 250’ but the brightness will
certainly be visible for miles in all directions.
You were not given any data about the
distance from which this light is visible, but
Professor Lynam has told me he can see the San Jose signs from Lick Observatory.
Although the sign will be near its primary
beneficiaries, the auto dealers, it is also near
and will be visible from our hills and agricultural
fields. The sign may be located in an urbanized area, but it is very close to our non-urbanized
countryside. You should consider the effect
beyond the site where it is erected. 101 has
been designated as a scenic highway by Santa
Clara County. The sign will also be visible from
Pacheco Pass and probably Hecker Pass
highways.
For a discussion of the impacts of the Project
on Lick Observatory, see Responses #A1, 2,
9, and 12.
3 Biological Resources: The lack of special
status species on the site cannot be construed
as saying this very tall, bright light will not
affect all species within a few miles, including
humans. It has the potential to alter animal
pathways and flight patterns and will certainly
be more stressful for humans.
For a discussion of the impacts of the Project
on biological resources, please see the
September 29, 2022 Response to
Comments, Responses #A9 and K6.
4 Cultural Resources: The Amah Mutsun Tribe
considers the Sargent Ranch and a large area
south of Gilroy to be part of their spiritual heritage. They believe in caring for Mother
Earth and living in harmony with nature. Since
the light will be visible from quite a distance it
will affect views to and from their heritage land.
The City is only required to discuss impacts
to "tribal cultural resources, " defined as (1)
"sites, features, places, cultural landscapes, sacred places and objects with cultural value
to a California Native American tribe" that are
included in the state or local register of
historical resources or that are determined to
be eligible for inclusion in the state register;
and (2) resources determined by the lead
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 37
19309265.12
agency, in its discretion, to be significant on
the basis of criteria for listing in the state
register of historical resources."
The City fully complied with AB 52 and CEQA
by contacting the California Native American
Heritage Commission to identify sacred sites
within the Proposed Sign Location/ vicinity. FCS, on behalf of the City notified tribal
representatives that may have an interest in
the tribal cultural resources within the vicinity
of the Proposed Sign Location, including the
Amah Mutsun Tribe. None of the nine tribes
contacted identified tribal cultural resources
that could be affected by the Project. (MND,
p. 47-48.)
The views from the Amah Mutsun Tribe's
traditional lands are not a tribal cultural
resources, as defined by CEQA, and therefore any potentially visible light from the
billboard on those lands would not be a
significant impact.
Sargent Ranch, meanwhile, is located
approximately four miles south of Gilroy. It
consists of Assessor Parcel Numbers
81038016, 81038017, 81038014, which are
located generally south of the interchange of
Highway 101 and Highway 25. A view from
the highway portion adjacent to the northernmost portion of the ranch
demonstrates that the City of Gilroy cannot
be seen from this location. Please see
Attachment D for a map of the vicinity and a
photo from the adjacent highway segment. To
the extent any tribal lands extend north of
Sargent Ranch, the sign also would not be
visible from the City's southern limit, as
vegetation, buildings, topography, and
distance (the Appellant's preferred sign
location is 1.5 miles from the City's southern
border at Bolsa Road) obstruct visibility.
5 Energy - The 52,400 kWh needed to operate
this sign annually is only compared to similar
For a discussion of the impacts of the Project
energy please see September 29, 2022
Response to Comments, Response #A12.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 38
19309265.12
signs. There should be a comparison to other
forms of energy consumption.
6 Land use and planning - Compatibility with
CalTrans Outdoor Advertising Act does not
insure that the sign won’t affect drivers or our natural environment. Chapter 8 of our General
Plan 2040 - Natural and Cultural Resources -
begins with the following: “Gilroy’s location in
the southern Santa Clara Valley, surrounded
by hills, streams, and agriculture, is one of the many reasons that residents love living here.
Gilroy has a proud, multi-cultural heritage that
spans centuries. These sensitive natural and
cultural resources are critical to Gilroy’s
vibrancy and prosperity, and therefore deserve
protection.” This sign does not protect our natural and cultural resources, it damages
them.
The MND fully evaluated the Project's
impacts to land use and planning and
determined that the Project would result in a less than significant impact, without
mitigation. (MND, pp. 80-81.) This comment
has not provided any evidence of a significant
impact to land use and planning in the City of
Gilroy. The proposed ordinance only allows digital displays in urban,
commercial/industrial areas. The display that
the Appellant has proposed fits these
parameters, and would be located in an
urbanized, auto row. Please see Attachment
B for photos of the Proposed Sign Location.
7 Transportation - I believe it could cause distracted driving. Signs, by their nature, are
designed to attract attention.
For a discussion of the Project's impact on driver distraction, please see the September
29, 2022 Response to Comments, Response
#A10.
8 Mandatory Findings of significance - This
section claims that the mandatory findings can
be mitigated. I disagree for the above reasons.
The data in this staff report were all geared to
promote your approval of these drastic
changes to our current sign ordinance. The
information provided is lengthy, detailed and
bureaucratic, hoping you will forget to use your
common sense and our community values.
Maybe Outfront Media thinks we are naive or
not equipped to analyze this proposal. Despite 500 pages in your packet I don’t believe you
have been given the balanced information you
need to determine whether it is important to
change our current sign ordinance. Please vote
NO.
This comment summarizes the comment
letter, and therefore no response is
warranted.
AK Email from Lizanne Davey, dated January 28, 2023
Please NO Electronic Billboards for Gilroy!!! We are not Las Vegas, nor do I want it to turn
into anything like them!
The comment does not question the content or conclusions of the MND, so no legal
response is warranted.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 39
19309265.12
AL Email from Kelly Larsen, dated January 28, 2023
Hello, I have been a resident of Gilroy for 15
years now. I moved here to get away from the
city (San Jose). I just wanted to state my
opinion that I think allowing electronic billboards, like the one being suggested near
10th street is a bad idea. Gilroy is not an urban
center with skyscrapers. They are distracting,
especially at night, in cities that have them. I
don't think they fit with the esthetic that the city
of Gilroy is going for.
For a discussion of the Project's impact on
driver distraction, please see the September
29, 2022 Response to Comments, Response
#A10. Land use compatibility issues are addressed in the MND, and the City's
independent consultant determined there
were no incompatibilities. Under the
proposed ordinance, digital signs would only
be permitted in urbanized, commercial areas,
like the location show in Attachment B.
AM Letter from John Miller, dated January 30, 2023
1 Dear Commissioners, I watched the video of
your January 19th meeting in which you
discussed the proposal to change the city Sign
Ordinance to allow for off premise digital
billboard advertising in Gilroy.
The decision-making process regarding the
proposed billboards while supposedly
depending on a “scientific” evaluation via
CEQA is first and foremost an exercise in
political judgment and community values. Since 2018 there has been only one official
Appellant seeking the Sign Ordinance be
changed to satisfy his financial interests and
that of some car dealers. Would not Politics
101 call indulging that Appellant an example of
catering to special interests over the interest of
the broader community?
Commissioners ought to be asking why one
single Appellant desiring to negate an existing
ordinance is sufficient to put in motion the time
and energy of staff in various city departments over a period of months if not years to pursue
changing the ordinance? Obviously it is to
further the interest of the Appellant and his
associates. Contending that somehow some of
the money generated by a giant intrusive digital billboard dominating the town’s appearance will
trickle down to the community is certainly not
an inference to be drawn from the Mitigated
Negative Declaration but rather a combination
For a discussion of the economic benefits of
electronic billboards, please see the February
2, 2023 letter submitted by the Appellant.
From the standpoint of basic civics, every
party has the right to ask a city for a change
in regulation, and democratic principles allow
for discussion of these requests in a public
forum. The Appellant and the applicant for
the proposed ordinance are available to
answer any questions in this setting. We have endeavored to provide the City with
facts, as opposed to editorials, and welcome
scrutiny of all information provided and
associated questions.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 40
19309265.12
of an urban legend and billboard industry
talking points.
In that regard the position of city staff including
the city attorney, instead of being honest
brokers and presenting to the Commission an
evenhanded presentation regarding the pros
and the cons of the proposal being considered, behave as if employed by Outfront Media. As
far as I could tell, staff is 100% behind the
proposal and very much relying on the
Mitigated Negative Declaration as the reason
why.
2 The Initial Study upon which this Mitigated
Negative Declaration is based concludes (and I
quote), that the proposed project, though
having "a significant effect on the environment…will not be a significant effect in
this case because revisions in the project have
been made by or agreed to by the project
proponent…” So we are expected to believe
that whatever concerns the MND identified can
be easily mitigated.
However, that conclusion is very much
debatable. That’s because there are several
assumptions inherent in this Mitigated Negative
Declaration that are not acknowledged.
Prominent among them is that the CEQA
process has been designed to evaluate typical
ecological and biological impacts of a proposed
development and an MND is not the proper
tool by itself to comprehensibly evaluate the
determinative aesthetic and economic dimensions unique to the impact of digital
billboards. Examples of these types of impacts
include: • billboards causing residential
property values to decrease; • the problem of
commercial properties sustaining business in
tourist destinations experiencing a proliferation
of off-premise advertising; • billboards
associated with an increase in litter and graffiti;
• and very significantly how many of the cities
with the greatest number of billboards have the lowest per capital gross domestic product while
CEQA serves the purpose of requiring a
public agency to review the environmental
impacts of a project, and to respond to public
comments on the project. Contrary to the commenter's statement, CEQA does require
evaluation of the Project's impact on
aesthetics and architectural resources. And
the MND appropriately evaluated the
Project's impact on these resource areas.
To the extent that the public comments on
issues outside of the scope of CEQA, the City
can certainly consider these comments when
making its decision on whether to approve
the Project. However, comments outside the
scope of CEQA would not provide grounds to
invalidate the MND.
We note that the commenter merely makes
claims, without offering evidence. The
Appellant manages numerous signs in
California and maintains them free of litter and graffiti, and evidence submitted by
Appellant demonstrates that communities
with outdoor advertising often have healthier
local businesses with higher revenues.
For a discussion of economic impacts, please
see the Appellant's letter to the Planning
Commission dated February 2, 2023 ("Letter
to City re Contribution of Digital Advertising to
Health of Local Economy").
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 41
19309265.12
many of those who prohibit them score higher
on that measure.
None of this information was in the MND and
the Appellant’s apologists went so far as to
comment that “Economic impacts are not
significant environmental impacts under CEQA.
14 Cal. Code Regs. §15131.” Precisely my point, which reinforces the view that CEQA is
not necessarily the best instrument to
accurately measure significant impacts
associated with billboards which is why the
proponents of this scheme are so enamored of
it. What other method of evaluation can so
easily dismiss citizen concerns by claiming
they are not relevant to what is being
considered by the method of analysis
employed?
If I were a Commissioner, I would want to fully understand why those significant impacts on
the environment in the examples I just
identified and those that were referenced in the
Initial Study, should not have been thoroughly
addressed in a more comprehensive
Environmental Impact Review. Somebody on
the city staff made a decision not to conduct an
EIR and instead called for an Appellant-friendly
MND, but the public and the Commissioners
have not been told why other than the brief and self justifying reasons listed in the MND
document itself.
3 That’s not surprising considering the Initial
Study and decision to declare an MND were undertaken behind closed doors and off the
public’s radar. That should prompt
Commissioners to ask, does the City Council,
stating it is open to considering this proposal,
therefore approve (and by inference authorize)
a blank check to pay for staff time and a
consultant to conclude that a Mitigated
Negative Declaration justifies the proposed
billboards? Or, as asserted by Cindy
McCormick in an email to me, “the Appellant pays for staff time, attorney time, and
consultant time.” If the latter, as one long-time
observer of the CEQA process told me, “when
The City has fully complied with CEQA's
public disclosure requirements and has involved the public throughout this process,
including by holding public meetings and
hearings, and soliciting and responding to
public comments on the IS/MND.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 42
19309265.12
the Appellant pays for the CEQA document the
Appellant generally gets the results they pay for.” Can city staff inform the Planning
Commission just how many dollars have been
spent on greasing the skids for this proposal
prior to the project having even been presented
to you Commissioners for consideration?
Perhaps that lack of transparency explains why
city attorney and planning department staff
time was authorized for work on this proposal
prior to the Planning Commission having even
preliminary answers to basic questions about
the alleged need to change the sign ordinance
prohibiting off premise advertising. Questions
about the history and current community
prohibition of off premise advertising in the
majority of municipalities in Santa Clara County
should have been answered early in the process instead of being left out as they have
been. One need only quote from the city of
Santa Clara’s Sign Code, 18.80.220 which
states “It had been determined that billboards,
by their very nature, wherever located and
however constructed, constitute visual clutter
and blight to the appearance of the City. It has
also been determined that billboards impede
traffic safety by unduly distracting motorists
and pedestrians, creating traffic hazards, and reducing the effectiveness of signs needed to
direct the public. It is the express intent of the
City Council to permit no further billboards
within the city and to reduce their number…”
Such an omission, seriously questions staff’s
contention that the billboard policy “best
practices” of neighboring communities to Gilroy
have been accurately related as part of staff’s
due diligence. They have not.
4 Gilroy Planning Commissioners should know
that Commissioners in other communities have
voted no on proposed billboards in part
because information relevant to their making
an informed decision was not provided by their staff. Here is a link to an op ed in the Mercury
News written by 3 of San Jose’s Airport
Commissioners explaining why a majority of
their body recommended to the City Council
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND, so no legal
response is warranted.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 43
19309265.12
that it reject the proposed digital billboards at
the San Jose airport. https://www.mercurynews.com/2021/11/29/opi
nion-why -wevoted- against-san-jose -airport -
digital-billboard-plans/
5 Gilroy Commissioners should also know that
CEQA protocol cautions about engaging in
what is called “pre-commitment,” a process
whereby a proposed project, needing approval
of a commission or city council, has become the recipient of significant staff time and
outside consultant input over several months.
The impact of such a process makes it much
more difficult for a planning commission or city
council to just say “no” when a final decision
must be made to approve a project. Not only does this diminish the role and purpose of your
commission it will set up the city of Gilroy for a
lawsuit alleging CEQA rule violations. For more
on pre-commitment see this article in California
Environmental Law Reporter, http://www.cbcearthlaw.com/uploads/1/1/8/8/11
883175/timing _is_everything.pdf Process
often determines outcomes. In this case, the
process that put this matter before the
Planning Commission is the equivalent of a
thumbs-on-the-scale, stacked-deck approach
on the part of city staff. Clearly, staff seems
more interested in supporting the objectives of
the proposed project Appellant than in staff’s
responsibility to you and to the taxpayers who
expect decisions to be made by designated decision makers not by out of view city staff
and costly consultants seduced by special
interests and dismissive of the community they
serve.
There has been no pre-commitmen t in
violation of CEQA. This MND has been
prepared at the appropriate time, before the
City Council has decided on the Project.
Additionally, CEQA review was conducted before the City and the Appellant entered into
a Development Agreement (which,
incidentally, has not occurred, and is not even
being considered yet by the City Council).
Mere agency interest in a project is not a
commitment. Financial investments in the form of CEQA review are necessary before
project approval, and not the type of
investments considered pre-commitment. If
such were the law, no city could ever make
any reasoned decision after environmental
analysis.
6 I mentioned that values play a role in your
decision-making process. In that regard,
please find below a link to perhaps the best
presentation on how off premise advertising
can destroy a community’s sense of place and
self identity. It is a TED talk by Ed McMahon
who holds the Charles E. Fraser Chair on
Sustainable Development at the Urban Land
Institute in Washington, DC. Well worth watching as a reminder that cities are first and
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND, so no legal
response is warranted.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 44
19309265.12
foremost communities and not revenue-
generating enterprises catering to special interests,
https://www.tedxjacksonville.com/talks/edmcm
ahon/ For a group with the right values closer
to home follow No Digital Billboards in San
Jose on Twitter here,
https://twitter.com/BillboardsNo
7 And one more thing. You as Commissioners
are not legally or ethically bound to accept the conclusions presented in the Mitigated
Negative Declaration. Decision making bodies
are free to accept or reject such off-the-shelf,
one-size -fits-all substitutions for serious and
comprehensive analysis. If you have problems
with how this proposal has been presented to you by staff; if you need more time to review
the material; if you need to hear from those
who oppose turning communities like Gilroy
into venues for outdoor digital advertising then
you have the right and responsibility to take control of the process before you reach a
decision on this very important matter. Thank
you for your attention.
The commenter is correct. The City is not
legally or ethically bound to approve the proposed ordinance amendment. We merely
request the City, in its tradition, make a
reasoned decision after considering
evidence, as opposed to rhetoric and
unsubstantiated claims.
8 Here is a graphic of the path to an MND
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND, so no legal
response is warranted.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 45
19309265.12
AN Email from Connie Rodgers, dated January 31, 2023
There are 2 articles about billboards in this
email. I hope you will read them and learn that
many jurisdictions either prohibit billboards,
especially electronic ones, or are trying to
phase them out.
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND, so no legal
response is warranted.
AO Email from Linda Berti, dated January 31, 2023
I am a resident of Gilroy, and I am opposed to
putting up such a huge billboard. It does not
represent our city. It will be an eyesore.
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the MND, so no legal
response is warranted.
AP Email from Theresia Konrad-Hypes, dated February 1, 2023
I am strongly opposed to allowing electronic billboards in Gilroy. They will ruin our country
feel and be distracting to drivers on Hwy 101.
Additionally, all the environmental reasons
against it.
For a discussion of the Project's impact on driver distraction, please see the September
29, 2022 Response to Comments, Response
#A10.
AQ Email from Georgia Stern and Joseph Stern, dated February 1, 2023
1 We are puzzled by why the city of Gilroy would
even consider installing an electronic billboard. What is this billboard supposed to accomplish?
At present, drivers and their passengers on
Hwy. 101 know of our automobile malls and
outlets, as they can see them from the
freeway. An electronic billboard is not needed
to encourage people who live in Gilroy to go
downtown or support local eateries. If the
people who live in Gilroy are not already
providing that support a huge, lit up billboard is
not going to change their minds. In fact, for some of us, it might do the opposite because of
our dislike for the added and unnecessary light
pollution. What type of advertisement is going
to be allowed to light up our night skies? Will it
just be for the city/businesses from Gilroy or
will ads from other nearby towns, such as
Morgan Hill and /or undesirable (think JUUL /
Vaping) ads be displayed? Who will determine
The Appellant has demonstrated the benefits
of an electronic billboard in the City of Gilroy. For local businesses, billboards have the
following benefits in that they: (i) help to
communicate with and attract new customers;
(ii) allow efficient targeting of consumers in a
given trade area; and (iii) are cost-effective
compared to other traditional media.
Furthermore, the size and placement
flexibility of billboards allow them to serve a
function that is different from a business’ on
premise signage. Small and local businesses, including travel-related businesses such as
hotels, restaurants, gas stations, and other
businesses related to entertainment and
tourism, are more reliant on billboards than
other types of businesses due to the need to
direct motorists to their location.
With respect to the City of Gilroy, outdoor
advertising could increase revenue for local
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 46
19309265.12
the billboards’ content, a for profit, non-local,
multi media company?
retail stores and the hospitality industry within
the City, which in turn are important to the vitality of the City’s economic health. Hotels,
restaurants, gas stations, and businesses
related to entertainment and tourism are
prime beneficiaries of outdoor advertising,
which could boost sales by up to 20%. In the City of Gilroy, there are at least 17 hotels, 89
restaurants, 19 gas stations, and many other
hospitality business. We understand these
businesses especially thrive during City
events such as the Garlic City Car Show and
Gilroy Farmers’ Market.
With respect to the types of advertisements
that would be allowed, the City, through a
development agreement, would be able to
prohibit content such as political speech,
cannabis, and any other types of objectionable content. For more information
on the City's ability to limit the types of
advertisements allowed, see the February 17,
2023 Appeal to the City Council.
2 There are many cities in the Bay Area that
have recently considered and deemed
undesirable these types of signs. They not only
contribute to light pollution of our night skies,
they distract drivers and confuse wildlife,
especially birds that fly at night. At a time when
many people are trying to get back in touch
with nature and encourage wildlife
conservation, how can we consider an
unnecessary polluter of our natural environment? Gilroy has much to be proud of
and showcase; our shared rural ambiance, our
hiking/biking tails, our parks, our pride in and
support of our local businesses, and much
more. We would encourage you to consider not
only how little an electronic billboard would do
to improve on these areas but also how much it
would harm them.
For a discussion of the Project's impact on
driver distraction, please see the September
29, 2022 Response to Comments, Response
#A10.
For a discussion of the impacts of the Project
on wildlife, please see the September 29,
2022 Response to Comments, Response
#A9 and G2.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 47
19309265.12
January 19, 2023 Oral Comments
Available here: https://gilroyca.new.swagit.com/videos/206076
AR Dr. Paul Lynam For a discussion of the Project's contribution
to scattered light, and its impact on the
environment, please see Responses #A1, 12.
For a discussion of the Project's measures to
reduce blue light, as compared to normal
LEDs, please see Response #A12.
For a discussion of the Project's contribution
to light pollution, please see Response #A2.
While the commenter may have presented
evidence that metropolitan light is detectible
between 200 and 300 kilometers from
astronomical sites, this is not substantial
evidence of a significant environmental
impact. Particularly since observatories have high-tech equipment capable of detecting
light millions of light-years away. Moreover,
this is not evidence that a single billboard will
affect astronomical research in the context of
billions of existing sources of metropolitan
light.
For a discussion of the Project's health
impacts, and a response to the commenter's
allegations that increased artificial light at
night has a potential to result in a public
health crisis of hormonally induced cancers,
see Response #A9.
AS Connie Rogers This commenter claimed that this Project is
incompatible with Gilroy's "image" as a beautiful, rural place, away from an urban
area.
For a discussion of the aesthetic impacts of
the Project, please see the September 29,
2022 Response to Comments, Response #A5. Please also see the MND for a
discussion of aesthetic and land use impacts.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 48
19309265.12
AT Ron Kirkish The Appellant agrees with the commenter's
statements that the Project's advantages
outweigh its disadvantages.
February 2, 2023 Oral Comments
Available here: https://gilroyca.new.swagit.com/videos/206874
AU Robert Weaver For a discussion of the Project's benefits to
local and small businesses, see Response
#AH4.
AV Connie Rogers For a discussion of the Project's benefits to
local and small businesses, see Response
#AH4.
The comment claims that the mitigation
measures are limited to the Proposed Sign
Location, but that the effect of the sign will
cover a much larger range. However, the sign
would be regulated and designed to restrict
brightness impacts to within 250 feet of the
sign, and miti gation measures are designed
to ensure such. For instance MM AES-1,
which requires City approval over operational
lighting parameters prior to the regular operation of the light-emitting diode (LED)
billboard, reduces potential impacts to day or
nighttime views in the area. (MND, p. 21-22.)
For a discussion of the Project's impacts on
cultural resources, see Response #AJ4.
The comment claims that Dark-Sky
communities are destination points. However,
Gilroy is not a Dark-Sky community. Dark-Sky
communities are certified by the International
Dark-Sky Association through a rigorous
application process requiring applicants to demonstrate robust community support for
dark sky protection and document category-
specific program requirements. Dark-Sky
communities are required to adopt stringent
requirements on all light sources through
local ordinances.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 49
19309265.12
Not only is Gilroy not a Dark-Sky community,
but the billboard would not be bringing light to a dark sky. Rather, the proposed ordinance
only allows billboards in commercial/industrial
areas and, accordingly, the Appellants
proposed location will exist in the middle of
an auto row in an area already impacts by
light pollution. (See Attachment B.)
AW Dr. Paul Lynam The commenter claims the CEQA is deficient
in categorizing impacts on the environment. In doing so, he concedes that CEQA does
not require evaluation of certain impacts,
such as impacts to the observatory.
The commenter cites to a study that
associates light pollution as mild cognitive
impairment, which he says is a proxy for the onset of dementia. Without citation to further
evidence, the commenter states that there
are many diseases and human health
consequences connected to light pollution.
These claims are not substantial evidence. The same commenter has already
misrepresented the findings of other studies
to suggest digital boards will cause cancer.
These claims are sensationalized and rely on
a foundation of misinformation.
For a discussion of the Project's health
impacts, and a response to the commenter's
allegations that increased artificial light at
night has a potential to result in a public
health crisis of hormonally induced cancers,
see Response #A9.
For a discussion of the Project's contribution
to scattered light, and its impact on the
environment, please see Responses #A1, 12.
The commenter's claim that the observatory
can already see a cluster of billboards along
the Northeast Side of 101 that is 17.5 miles
from the observatory is not substantial
evidence of that the Project will cause a
significant impact. A telescope designed to
view stars located light years away certainly
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 50
19309265.12
can see something within a 17.5 mile radius,
and this fact is irrelevant. Further, the commenter acknowledges that the
technology of the existing billboards may be
different from the technology of the new
billboards.
AX Michelle Nelson For a discussion of the Project's impact on
driver distraction, please see the September
29, 2022 Response to Comments, Response
#A10.
For a discussion of the Project's benefits to
local and small businesses, see Response
#AH4.
There was an abundance of community
involvement in the process, the City held a
public informational meeting, two Planning Commission hearings, and the City Council
will hold a hearing on the appeal.
For a discussion of the impacts of the Project
on wildlife, please see the September 29,
2022 Response to Comments, Response
#A9 and G2.
For a discussion of the health impacts of the
Project, please see Response #A9 above.
For a discussion of the Project's contribution
to light pollution, please see Response #A2.
For a discussion of the Project's compliance
with the General Plan, please see Response
#I and see the February 17, 2023 Appeal of
Planning Commission’s February 2, 2023
Denial of Ordinance Change, pp. 14-22.
AY Danny Mitchell This comment expresses support for the
Project, and the Appellant agrees with the
comments.
AZ Jeff Orth This comment expresses a majority support
for the Project from the chamber commerce,
and individual support for the Project. The
Appellant agrees with the comments.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 51
19309265.12
BA John Miller For a discussion of the aesthetics impacts of
the Project, and its impact to the local landscape, please see the September 29,
2022 Response to Comments, Response
#A5.
For a discussion of the Project's benefits to
local and small businesses, see Response
#AH4.
The commenter claims that the MND is
illegitimate because CEQA does not require
consideration of economic impacts or social
impacts. However, as explained in Response
# I3 CEQA is concerned with impacts on the
environment. This does not limit the Planning
Commission's consideration of economic or
social impacts in making its decision.
However, economic and social impacts are
not valid reasons to invalidate the MND.
As explained in the Appellant's February 17,
2023 appeal to the City Council, billboard
companies are not litigious. Never has any
jurisdiction where the Appellant's digital signs
are located found the signs to be in non-
compliance with a local ordinance, and never
has the Appellant sued one of these public
agency partners. The lawsuits that this
commenter, and other commenters,
reference are either those brought by activist groups (not billboard companies), or rare,
out-of-state lawsuits initiated by Outfront to
protect its rights against overreaching
governments.
BB Jason Heap This San Jose resident, from No Digital
Billboards in San Jose compared the Project
with the billboard ordinance in San Jose,
which resulted in 12 proposed electronic
billboards.
He claims that allowing one or two billboards
will open the floodgates to allow more
billboards. However, this is inconsistent with
his evidence that none of San Jose's 12
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 52
19309265.12
proposed electronic billboards have been
built. Nor is it cognizant of basic legal principles that allow a city to limit the number
of advertising displays within its jurisdiction.
As discussed in Response #M6, the
Ordinance is limited to two billboards and the
City has full police powers to deny any
additional billboards that are proposed.
BC Les Levitt For a discussion of the energy and
greenhouse gas impacts of the Project, please see the September 29, 2022
Response to Comments, Response #A12.
With respect to the types of advertisements
that would be allowed, the City, through a
development agreement, would be able to
prohibit content such as political speech, cannabis, and any other types of
objectionable content. For more information
on the City's ability to limit the types of
advertisements allowed, see the February 17,
2023 Appeal to the City Council.
For a discussion of the potential for the
Project to result in more than two billboards,
see Responses #M6, BB.
For a discussion of the potential for the
Project to result in litigation, see Response
#BA.
BD Michele Campbell This commenter discusses the benefits of
billboards to the community, and small
businesses. the Appellant agrees with the
comments submitted.
BC March 14, 2023 Email from John Miller and Attachments
1 My name is John Miller. I’m on the Steering
Committee of No Digital Billboards in San
Jose.
I’m writing to express opposition to allowing
digital billboards in Gilroy. We believe many of
the experiences we have had in opposing the
Throughout his letter, the commenter relies
on bold factual inaccuracies. It begins with
the false statement that a majority of the
jurisdictions in Santa Clara County prohibit
off-premise advertising. In fact, a majority of
jurisdictions in Santa Clara County do not
prohibit off premise advertising. The Cities of
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 53
19309265.12
plan to permit digital billboards in San Jose to
be relevant to the proposal you are considering.
Currently Gilroy, like the majority of
jurisdictions in Santa Clara County, prohibits
off premise advertising. To be clear, we are talking about signs or billboards, (digital or
not), that advertise products and services not
available at the location of the sign. Again to
be clear, off premise signs are not on premise
signs, (digital or not), that identify a business,
retailer, or office building.
Sa n Jose (Muni Code § 23.04.400), Santa
Clara (Muni Code § 18.80.220), Palo Alto (Muni § 16.20.120), Mountain View (Muni
Code §§ 3.18.1 et seq.), Milpitas (Muni Code
§ XI -10-24.05), Morgan Hill (Muni Code §
5.04.520), Saratoga (Muni Code § 15-30.050,
this section prohibits mobile billboard advertising displays but not billboards), Los
Altos Hills (Muni Code § 8-6.05), and Monte
Sereno (Muni Code § 10.13.010) all allow off-
premise advertising. The County of Santa
Clara also allows billboards. (See, e.g., Santa
Clara County Code, Table 2.50-1.)
2 Here are questions concerning the proposed
billboards in Gilroy that need to answered for
the City Council to properly evaluate the proposal. The first, who is the applicant
appealing the decision of the Planning
Commi ssion to reject this proposal? Is it Mr.
Conrotto or is it out of town Outfront Media,
headquartered in New York City, and who as far as we know, employs not a single person
who actually lives in Gilroy? One or the other
ought to be the designated applicant and only
one of them should be allowed to present their
case before the Council, not three people
making three presentations representing one
applicalnt as happened before the Planning
Commission. To my knowledge none of the
proposals' opponents have had three
opportunities to publicly make their case
before a city body so far.
The Gilroy Zoning Ordinance provides that a
Planning Commission decision may be
appealed by either the applicant or an interested party. (30.52.50.) Mr. Conrotto is
the original applicant for the ordinance
change to permit two electronic billboards
within the City of Gilroy. The Appellant
appealed the decision as an interested party and Mr. Conrotto signed on as co-appellant.
This procedure is proper under the Gilroy
Zoning Code.
While Outfront is headquartered in New York,
all Northern California operations are handled
from company's local office in Berkeley,
California. Outfront has numerous offices
throughout the state.
3 An equally compelling question — have
members of the City Council received even
one phone call from one resident who said, “What this town needs are digital billboards”?
They did not at least not until Mr. Conrotto and
his favorite billboard company, Outfront Media,
got certain people excited about the many
alleged benefits of digital billboards. One
group, Gilroy’s auto dealers, thinks it will
dramatically increase sales from advertising
on a billboard
Many Gilroy residents have expressed
support for electronic billboards in Gilroy. The
Appellant's proposed billboard ordinance has received 8 support letters and 82 petitions of
support from businesses and residents within
Gilroy. The support letters all share the same
sentiment that billboards would bring
necessary additional revenue to local
businesses and the City, and that the City’s
additional sales tax revenue would benefit the
City’s residents through an increase in
funding that would go towards necessary
municipal services, such as first responders and public parks.
4 In reality, customer purchasing behavior is
complex. So how do we make decisions about
The comment misrepresents the Appellant's
statements. The Appellant has never said
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 54
19309265.12
buying cars? While the billboard companies
want us to believe the answer to all business problems is to put up a billboard, the study
below concludes billboards play no role in
advertising decisions influencing how we
purchase cars. (Attachment #1) All
attachments referenced are attached in one file at the end of this email.
[Image]
Source: Types of ads influencing car-buying
decisions in the U.S. as of October 2012,
Published by Statista Research Department,
Oct 24, 2012,
https://www.statista.com/statistics/259115/type
s-of-ads-influencing-car -buying-decisions-in-
the-us/
Though this study is now 11 years old, given
the advances of online technology including
the importance of social media, logic would
suggest that the study’s conclusions are even
more true today. See below more recent
studies that affirm the findings of the Statista
research. (Attachment #2).
[Image]
that "the answer to all business problems is
to put up a billboard." Instead, the Appellant has provided evidence that billboard
advertising is less expensive than online
advertising, and therefore more affordable for
small and local businesses.
The comment relies on an article that is only
accessible to account holders of the
database, and is therefore not publicly
available.2 We note the source and
methodology of the survey are not specified.
We also note the commenter takes issue with
the publication year of sources that Appellant
has cited but then cites a source that is more
than a decade old.
5 Outfront Media also stirred up excitement by
donning the guise of a philanthropy anxious to give away valuable advertising space on
digital billboards for community messages or
for Amber Alerts or other emergency
notifications or for “branding” the community
by putting Gilroy’s name on the billboard.
The Ordinance requires the billboard to
display public information, emergency alerts, and other public service announcements on
the electronic billboards. The Appellant's
commitment to provide community and
emergency usage to the City is not
disingenuous. Outfront is a private company,
but has a genuine desire to be a part of the
Gilroy community by providing these
services. Outfront has partnerships with
dozens of California cities and counties and
has been a good citizen in each. One
2 In general, to the extent public commenters have referred to sources (e.g., books, articles) that
are not publicly available, these sources do not qualify as evidence. It is the responsibility of public commenters, as a matter of due process, to submit full and complete copies of sources
they cite when such sources are not the commenters themselves, and where such sources are
not accessible to everyone.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 55
19309265.12
jurisdiction, the County of Alameda, even
offered to have a discussion with City staff to share its perspective on public-private
partnerships it has with Outfront.
6 But the truth is billboard companies, and the property owners that lease their land to them,
seek to negate billboard bans in communities
like Gilroy because billboards, especially
digital billboards, are very profitable. And they
are particularly profitable when they advertise the products and services of national
advertisers such as Citibank, Verizon, Coke
and McDonalds. Despite the claims that have
been made by Outfront Media regarding the
extent to which digital billboards carry
advertisements for local businesses, our experience documents a medium in which
national advertising dominates. In that regard,
many of the small, one or two person
businesses, that signed the petition submitted
by Outfront Media in support of this proposal would not be able to afford to advertise on a
$900,000 digital billboard. In fact, we’re
unconvinced even the Gilroy auto dealers will
find such a billboard affordable (if even
available) despite Outfront insisting it will be.
Accordingly, please see the short video we
have recently prepared about just what
products and services get advertised on digital
billboa rds in the Bay Area,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LEDF -
WuhF1E (Attachment #3).
This comment contains baseless allegations that (1) outdoor advertising disproportionately
represents national brands and that
(2) outdoor advertising is not affordable to
local businesses. This comment fails to
support its allegations with any statistics or reliable sources. The comment claims they
know "the truth," based on a melo dramatic 30
second YouT ube video prepared by the anti-
billboard group, "No Digital Billboards in San
Jose." This YouT ube video cherry-picks nine
examples of billboard ads. It states "most adds on billboards are for national
companies" without citation to any data or
surveys, and does not attempt to conduct an
objective survey. This video is symptomatic of
the commenters tactics; shout loudly, without citing evidence.
In contrast, the data shows that small and
local businesses are well-represented in the
outdoor advertising industry. Specifically,
national surveys find that local businesses
represent approximately 70% of advertising
industry revenues. (See February 2, 2023
Letter to City of Gilroy regarding Contribution
of Digital Advertising to Health of Local
Economy (“February 2, 2023 Letter”).) In the San Francisco Bay Area market, local
businesses account for 64% of the total
billboard advertising market. Outfront keeps
these statistics and the 64% figure comes
from Outfront's databases. Small and local
businesses, travel-related businesses such
as hotels, restaurants, gas stations, and
businesses related to entertainment and
tourism are especially reliant on billboards
due to the need to direct motorists to their location or convince them of the benefits of
the business as they pass by. (Id.)
It is untrue that the local businesses who
have supported the project would not be able to afford to advertise on the digital billboard.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 56
19309265.12
And the comment makes this claim with
disregard for facts or data. On average, it costs $7.50 to reach 1,000 people with digital
place-based media. (Id.) Compared to other
media sources, it costs approximately $6.75
for radio, $23.33 for podcasts, $13.24 for
magazines, $46.82 for newspaper, $20 for broadcasting TV, $12 for cable TV, and
$2.21-$10.47 for online advertising per
$1,000 people. (Id.) The price range for
advertising on Outfront’s digital billboard is
affordable. The very fact that 64 percent of ad
space in the Bay Area is occupied by local
businesses proves this assertion.
7 According to Outfront Media, one of the most
significant alleged benefits to Gilroy from billboards is supposed to be a dramatic
increase in sales for local advertisers and
correspondingly a dramatic increase for Gilroy
from increased sales taxes. Note that much of
the evidence for such claims is based on out of state and out of date studies (the dates of
which have not been included in many of the
references Outfront has provided in its Feb.
2nd letter to the Gilroy Planning Commission
whic h is attached. (Attachment #4).
Please refer to my detailed analysis below of
the footnotes in the letter. Many of these same
arguments have been presented directly to the
City Council. (Attachment #5).
While the Appellant acknowledges that the
February 2 letter regarding the contribution of billboards to the local economy cites studies
from 2001 and 2002, it also cites to ample
current evidence from 2018, 2019, and 2022.
The authority is the only study to survey
business owners regarding the percent of sales attributed to outdoor advertising and,
while it is from 20-years ago, it is still
relevant. Outfront, which operates more than
500,000 billboards in the United States, has
not seen evidence that would contradict the
conclusion of these studies. Business
demand for advertising space on signs
continues to remain strong, meaning
Outfront's clients continue to see significant
economic benefits from advertising in this
manner.
8 So according to Outfront, increased sales,
incr eased sales taxes and even some
mysterious cash payment from Outfront to the city are all forthcoming. These benefits, for
reasons unexplained, are to be negotiated
after you Council members change the sign
ordinance not before. Just to be clear, the
Council is being asked by the proponents of
this proposal (and apparently by the city
attorney) to change the ordinance. In essence,
this would negate the prohibition on off
premise signs plus water down several of the
provisions in the Gilroy General Plan on a vague promise that the specifics of what that
will mean for the City are to be determined in a
closed negotiation symbolically off the radar
The February 2 letter estimates the economic
benefit that local businesses will receive
when they utilize the electronic billboard. While the exact economic benefit is
uncertain, the studies relied upon by
Appellant show that there is an increase in
sales and sales tax associated with outdoor
advertising.
As discussed in Response I, the Ordinance
complies with the General Plan. Indeed, it
cannot "water down" the General Plan, as no
changes to the General Plan are proposed.
For a further discussion of the Project's
compliance with the General Plan, the
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 57
19309265.12
and in the dead of night. Would you strike
such a deal in conducting your personal financial affairs? Of course you wouldn’t. So
why should you do so when you are
representing the interests of the City? In
addition, doing so would be to delegate your
powers of analysis and decision making to unelected city staff, which would also
constitute a lack of transparency and
accountability that ought to be unacceptable.
February 17, 2023 Appeal of Planning
Commission’s February 2, 2023 Denial of Ordinance Change, pp. 14-22.
The comment misreads the Ordinance and
misstates the nature of the City Agreement
required under the Ordinance. Pursuant to the Ordinance, the City Agreement that sets
forth required fees, and revenues, among
other project details, is subject to the City
Council's final approval authority. Such a
review will be conducted in public hearings
with opportunities for substantial public input.
9 And speaking of city staff, it was clear from the
start that staff decided to support the proposal
without, as far as I know, even presenting to decision makers the merits of the opposition
argument. Instead of being an honest broker
bringing to the Planning Commission and to
the City Council a balanced pro and con
presentation as one would expect, the staff put its thumb on the scales and supported the
proposal apparently without reservation. Why
is that the case? Is there no one in Gilroy
government aware of the CEQA prohibition
against what is called a pre commitment? In
every day language that means advocating a
position as to literally prevent the decision
making body from reaching another
conclusion than that supported by the staff.
Doing so can get you sued. For details see the
attached article on pre commitment from the California Law Reporter. (Attachment #6).
The processes for zoning text amendments
and CEQA review involve several
opportunities for members of the public to present written and oral comments. The
result of this process is that by the time the
item is up for consideration by the governing
body, all perspectives have been presented,
and can be considered when a decision is made. Here, the full spirit of public
participation has been realized, where
dozens of comments, including opposing
arguments, have been presented to the
decision-making bodies.
City staff carefully evaluated the merits of this
proposal before presenting it to the Planning
Commission. However, there is no
requirement for a staff recommendation to
present a "pro con presentation," as the comment insists. Rather, it is standard
procedure for staff to provide a specific
recommendation, and support for that
recommendation. Almost every jurisdiction in
the State of California operates in this
manner. City staff have substantial planning
and environmental expertise, and
decisionmakers often appreciate hearing an
informed recommendation on a matter.
For a Response to the allegations of pre
commitment, see Response # AM5.
10 In addition to process issues the City Council
should know that the majority of other
jurisdictions in Santa Clara County protect
This comment contains sensationalized
claims and rhetoric, and no response is
merited.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 58
19309265.12
their residents and visitors from being forced
to look at unsolicited commercial messages on billboards. Why would Gilroy do the opposite,
allowing its residents and visitors to be a
captive audience to unsolicited commercial
messages for which there is no off switch?
Does Mr. Conrotto subscribe to a cable TV channel that shows only commercials and no
programming? Of course he doesn’t. And he
would resent being forced to. Yet in
advocating for this proposal he is expecting
his fellow Gilroy residents to become exactly
that — a captive audience as they drive on a
publicly supported road, the maintenance of
which is paid for by them and not by Outfront
Media. In fact, unlike a trucking company
Outfront pays no road user fee at all though
its' billboards have no value except in their exposure to the public right of way. There is a
word to describe such a practice and it is the
word “parasite."
11 But we have been reassured that this proposal
you are considering allows for only two digital
billboards, or is it actually three? Even before
the ordinance has been changed and before
terms of the deal worked out behind closed
doors advocates are already pushing for
additional billboards to be part of the deal. We
told you so. This is exactly how the billboard
industry works.
The proposed Ordinance is unambiguous, it
states "[a] maximum of two (2) electronic
billboard(s) may be permitted in the City of
Gilroy."
12 If the Council approves the proposed
billboards what argument will it make when
others in the community want to put billboards
on their property? Is the City is going to grant
Mr. Conrotto and Outfront Media an exclusive municipal charter thereby excluding all other
property owners in town (and their favorite
billboard company), from constructing their
own billboards? On what grounds will the City
defend itself (at taxpayer expense) when the
lawsuits begin? If you doubt the litigious
nature of the billboard industry, as
representative, I quote from Outfront Media's
own 2021 United States Securities and
Exchange Commission, Form 10K, dated December 31, 2021, (in which litigation is
mentioned 12 times):
The comment proposes absurd hypothetical
scenarios far outside of the scope of the
Project under consideration.
In d oing so, it relies on two baseless allegations: (1) approving the Appellant's
proposed billboard would lead to lawsuits by
other property owners who want to erect on-
premises advertising signs; and (2) Outfront
is litigious.
First, approving Appellant's proposed
billboard will not lead to litigation by property
owners within the City of Gilroy that want to
erect their own on premise advertising signs, because on-premise signs are treated
differently from billboards. On-premise signs
are allowed within the City of Gilroy.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 59
19309265.12
Item 3. Legal Proceedings.
On an ongoing basis, we are engaged in lawsuits and governmental proceedings and
respond to various investigations,
inquiries, notices and claims from national,
state and local governmental and other
authorities (collectively, “litigation”). Litigation is inherently uncertain and always
difficult to predict. Although it is not possible to
predict with certainty the
eventual outcome of any litigation, in our
opinion, none of our current litigation is
expected to have a material adverse effect on
our results of operations, financial position or
cash flows
Source:
https://s23.q4cdn.com/429815947/files/doc_financials/2021/q4/Final-2021.12.31-10-K-
Outfront.pdf Also see attached a
representative listing of multiple lawsuits
entered into by Outfront Media in several
states over the past 8 years. (Attachment #7).
Specifically, Gilroy Municipal Code section
30.37.40, which governs signs in residential and agricultural districts, provides that “All
signs within residential districts shall be
complementary to the building design, as
determined by and subject to the approval of
the zoning administrator;” and section 30.37.50, which governs signs in commercial
and industrial districts, states that “Signs shall
be located and erected only upon the
premises occupied by the person or business
to be identified or advertised by such signs.”
Second, Outfront is not litigious. Lawsuits are
an inevitable part of doing business and their
existence is not indicative of a business’
nature. To demonstrate, popular companies
with excellent reputations such as Lowes, Costco, and Patagonia are constantly
involved in lawsuits. Specifically in the 2013-
2023 period, Patagonia has been involved in
129 lawsuits, Lowes has been involved in
more than 6,500, and Costco has been
involved in more than 7,900. Even Oprah
Winfrey has been sued 77 times, and
counting. Outfront, as the operator of more
than 500,000 signs in North America, cannot
avoid the possibility of lawsuits. The commenter has included information on ten
lawsuits in which Outfront was involved. Not
one of these lawsuits involved a dispute
among Outfront and a partner city or county
about a digital sign agreement. The
information provided by the commenter is a
proverbial "garbage dump of information."
Some so-called lawsuits were not actually
lawsuits at all (e.g., a matter in Crescent City
did not involve litigation). One suit, in San
Francisco, involved Outfront acting on the
same side as a city, and the court held that
cities can control political advertising,
contradicting a point made by ordinance
opponents. The remainder of the lawsuits
largely includes filings from across the United States, most of which involve claims by
Outfront of a constitutional taking (and which
Outfront won a majority of the time). On this
last point, we ask the City to appreciate that
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 60
19309265.12
there are tens of thousands of local
governments in the United States and, if the last twelve years of activity by the federal
government are any indication, one can
safely say that governments do not always
act lawfully. Outfront is protective of its
interests, especially with respect to constitutional takings, and its defenses of
property interests have not only benefited
Outfront, but all property owners.
As noted before, Outfront has had successful
partnerships with dozens of cities and
counties throughout California, including
without limitation, the City of Santa Clara, the
City of Millbrae, Alameda County, the City of
South San Francisco, the City of San Pablo,
the City of Fairfield, the City of El Monte, the City of Bell Gardens, the City of Buena Park,
and the City of Hawthorne. Never has any of
these public agency partners in California
ever found Outfront’s digital signs to be in
non-compliance with a local ordinance, and
never has Outfront sued any of these public
agency partners.
13 Please understand that opponents of this
proposal are not anti business. We believe
there is a difference between a government
and a business and that the city of Gilroy
should not be operated as if it were indistinguishable from a business. It should
not evaluate public policy only on how much
revenue it might generate for one or two
favored businesses in town or for the city itself
especially when how much revenue would go
to the City won’t be determined until after the
ordinance is changed and it may be too late to
amend or cancel the deal.
The revenue generated by the Project is not
the only factor under consideration; the MND
itself demonstrates that the City has carefully
considered the environmental impacts of the
Project, in addition to the economic benefits.
14 Remember there is no constitutional right to
put up a billboard. Nobody has a right to put
up a billboard that is more important than the
collective right of the community to prohibit
them. That has been reaffirmed in the nation’s
highest court.
The Appellant has not argued that it has a
constitutional right to construct a billboard.
We appreciate the City Council has discretion
to approve or deny the proposed ordinance.
The authority for the City to enact land use
and zoning laws derives from the City's police
power. As a result, the City's authority to
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 61
19309265.12
allow construction of an electronic billboard
derives from its police power as well.
15 Finally, I would suggest what common sense
dictates. If something sounds too good to be
true it probably is too good to be true. To be blunt, Outfront Media, a publicly traded
company with annual revenue of $1.7 billion,
thinks it is conning the rubes. The people of
Gilroy are depending on you, the City Council,
not to fall for it.
The Appellant has been transparent and
respectful of all parties — even project
opponents when they have fabricated evidence and made baseless claims. This
comment consists of rhetoric and does not
merit further responses.
BD March 14 Email from Leslie Levitt
1 There are many reasons to oppose billboards
but here are two that relate closely to the role
of the City Council.
Environmental Policy
Approving digital billboards represents
regressive environmental policy. Municipalities
should be leading advocates for policies that
mitigate climate change and encourage efficient use of energy. Electronic billboards
are giant symbols of wasteful energy use.
[See the attached memo].
The March 1, 2022 Memo is expressly in the context of the San Jose City Council policy 6-
4, and therefore it is not relevant to the City of
Gilroy's billboard ordinance.
Outfront has taken measures to reduce its
energy use and increase its sustainability. For
example, nearly all of its billboards, digital
and static, use more energy efficient LED
illumination – reducing its energy use by
76.79% from pre-conversion levels.
For a discussion of the Project's impact on
energy and climate change, please see the
September 29, 2022 Response to
Comments, Response #A12.
2 Risk Avoidance and Council Purview
It is best for municipalities to stick to land use
rules and policies and Planning objectives that
apply equally to all. Making policy for one site
and one applicant doesn't work long term and
it would be naive to think that this is a one and
done deal as far as billboards.
Any other place where you see Outfront, you
see Clear Channel and others. The video
produced by No Digital Billboards in San Jose
titled "Why Digital Billboards Don't Benefit
Local Businesses" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LEDF -
WuhF1E shows an example in Santa Clara,
where Outfront has digital billboards on one
side of the freeway, and within sight on the
other side of Highway 101 is another digital
billboard owned by Clear Channel.
This comment misreads the Ordinance. The
Ordinance does not apply to only one site, it
involves a zoning ordinance for the zoning
code as a whole. Billboards are not allowed
on a single site, they are allowed within the
General Services Commercial or City
Gateway District, and within 660 feet of
Highway 101.
While the MND includes environmental
review of a single billboard proposed by the
Appellant, it is entirely possible that another
billboard company could avail itself of the
new ordinance.
For a discussion of the potential for the
Ordinance to result in litigation, see
Response #BA.
The Ordinance has no potential to result in any more than two billboards, because it
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 62
19309265.12
Once the door opens to one billboard
company, the others will expect to be let in. And if the City, after approving one billboard,
tries to refuse another property owner or
billboard company up the road, they will be
sued and so will begin a never ending drain on
the City staff and City Attorney. Note that Outfront, who claims this will not happen, is
currently suing the City of San Jose because
the City gave a contract to their competitor.
Furthermore, the idea that the City of Gilroy is
thinking of getting in the middle of a contract
between two private parties with a project on
private property is foolhardy, especially with a
controversial situation like this. That's also
asking for more risk and more staff time all for
the sake of a special interest.
expressly restricts the number of billboards to
two.
BE March 14, 2023 Letter from Dr. Lynam
1 The appeal (by only one or two commercial
interests) of the Planning Commission's 2
February 2023 denial of ordinance change
seeks, in effect, to overturn an ordinance which has served the entire population of
Gilroy (and its hinterland) well for decades. In
suppressing Light At Night, LAN (a.k.a. light
pollution) the existing ordinance is arguably
more needful today than when first introduced.
Further, the appeal effectively asks that the City of Gilroy deliver a monopoly into the
hands of those same commercial interests -- a
move which in due course may see the City
challenged in the courts by competitors. This
is the latest episode in the proliferation of light-polluting digital billboards (and the large
quantities of blue-rich light emitting diodes,
LEDs they utilize over large surface areas)
along the highway 101 corridor. Over the past
five years, ordinances have been modified to
allow new electronic billboards in the City of
San Joe, Norman Y. Mineta San Jose
International Airport, the City of Santa Clara
and elsewhere in the South San Francisco
Bay Area.
In his letter, Dr. Lynam agrees with the
Appellant's statement that it would be
irresponsible to claim that a digital billboard
will cause cancer and other diseases. He declares, with emphasis, that "no such claim
has ever been made," and further declares
that "[n]o study has concluded that digital
signs cause disease and other maladies."
Despite his assertions that there is no
evidence that a digital billboard will cause cancer and other diseases, he curiously
continues to assert throughout his letter that
the billboard will contribute to "Light At Night"
or "LAN," and that there are "causal
connections" to cancer and disease.
It is puzzling why Dr. Lynam would continue
to make claims after having acknowledged
there is no evidence to support his claims.
2 LAN: It's happening. It's outdoor LEDs. We're
sure. It's bad (and getting worse). We can fix
it.
There are many sources of night at light in
urban areas beyond just electronic billboards
including lights from homes, floodlights in
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 63
19309265.12
stadiums, streetlights, traffic lights, planes,
factories, schools, offices, car dealerships, golf course, ports, parking lots, moons, and
stars.
Because the Lick Observatory sits in the
middle of megacities that emit billions of light sources, Appellant's proposed billboard
would constitute a de minimis, inconsiderable
contribution to nighttime light in the City of
Gilroy and the Bay Area. (See Attachment C
below.)
3 In addition to concerns of visual blight, the
environment, climate and public health, this
regional trend of accelerating light pollution
threatens to impact the University of California Observatories' Lick Observatory (UCO/Lick)
and its mission.
As stated in previous submissions (e.g. Lynam
2022) UCO/Lick has no wish to crusade in pursuit of the ideal of having no illuminating
sources at all. A higher aspiration is to sustain
the rapport and understanding between
neighboring communities and observatory that
has endured since the 1870s. Responsibly
and sensitively installed billboards may confer
benefits to the community. However, over
nearly two years, Lick Observatory's advocacy
(beginning with Lynam 2021), recommending
that Gilroy incorporate the International Dark-
Sky Association, IDA guidance for Electronic Message Centers (2019) into the ordinance
has been consistently rebuffed.
The comment does not question the content
or conclusions of the Electronic Billboard
Ordinance Project (“Project”) Initial
Study/Mitigated Negative Declaration (“MND”), so no response is warranted.
Notwithstanding the above, the MND
evaluated impacts of light and glare and
determined impacts would be less than
significant.
Additionally, many are unaware of the
meticulous design of digital billboards. These
billboards incorporate on-site sensors that
measure ambient conditions and adjust the
sign’s brightness accordingly, ensuring that it
operates only slightly brighter than its
surroundings. Furthermore, the billboard in
question, if ever approved, will be operated at
a luminosity level that is one-sixth the
illumination intensity standards set by the California Outdoor Advertising Act and
Vehicle code. This brightness level will be no
more than 0.3 foot candles at a distance of
250 feet, which is equivalent to the brightness
one would perceive while looking at a candle
through a dark filter. Moreover, the individual
light emitting diodes (LEDs) on the sign’s
display facing are angled downward towards
motorists, resulting in less light pollution and
glare compared to traditionally illuminated signs. In fact, the light from an Outfront sign
is barely detectable on a light meter at a
distance of 250 feet.
4 The appeal dismisses, disregards and denies:
This comment lists several issues raised by
Dr. Lynam in this letter, and are addressed in
more detail below. Dr. Lynam's citations
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 64
19309265.12
1. The City of Gilroy's guiding principles,
outlined in its 2040 General Plan advocating: measures to limit light pollution from outdoor
sources.
2. The findings of the City of Gilroy's own
panel of experts, in the form of the Planning Commission which, after considered
assessment: (a) Found the Initial
Study/Mitigated Negative Declaration
(IS/MND) inadequate, and (b) Denied the
ordinance change.
3. Examples from other Californian local
authorities whereby the City of Gilroy could
achieve a better deal than prescribed by the
appellants (e.g. imposing illuminated sign
hours of operation; incentivizing billboard relocation and take-down; requiring a
guaranteed minimum revenue).
4. That blue-rich LED technology deployed in
outdoor lighting devices (such as digital
billboa rds) contributes disproportionately (via a
number of mechanisms) to LAN and renders a
deleterious impact on the activity of Lick
Observatory. In recent years, as witnessed
from Mount Hamilton (and elsewhere), the rate of increase in sky background has accelerated
(predominantly resulting from scattered light
emanating from settlements along the
Highway 101 corridor). This erodes
researchers ability to detect astronomical
sources, compelling longer exposure times,
thereby reducing the efficiency of an institution
that began continuously contributing to
science just twelve years after Gilroy was
incorporated.
5. Recommendations to adopt guidelines to
minimize damage to dark skies, developed by
the IDA. Experience shows that adoption of
the full set of IDA guidance does not deter
outdoor media companies' efforts to deploy new-technology billboards. That the proposal
for digital billboards to be placed in Gilroy has
consistently rebuffed these recommendations
is, in this writer's experience, extraordinary.
amount to a document dump of generic
studies. Generic studies unsupported by facts related to the Project are not substantial
evidence of the Project’s specific impacts.
See Plastic Bag Coalition v. City of
Manhattan Beach (2011) 52 Cal.4th 155.
CEQA is clear that expert opinion may constitute substantial evidence, but only if it is
supported by facts. 4 Cal. Code Regs.
§15063(a)(3) (emphasis added.) Under this
body of law, Dr. Lynam's list of studies are
not substantial evidence of a significant
impact on the environment. They fail due to
lack of relevance, lack of foundation,
invocation of unreliable hearsay, and other
legal theories, and this uncurated information
should be discarded. Even a city's
environmental experts, who come to this process with professional expertise, have
information disclosure duties. For instance, a
CEQA do cument may incorporate by
reference another document only when it is a
matter of public record or is generally
available to the public. (Pub. Resources Code
§ 21061; 4 Cal. Code Regs. §15150.) If the
City's environmental analysis adopted the
same evidentiary approaches as the
commenter's, it would fail for want of substantial evidence..
Moreover, the comment letter relies on
studies not contained in its list of references,
and which are not accessible to the public.
For example, the comment relies on "Chen et
al. (2022)" for the contention that "policy-
makers should take effective measures to
curb the surging light pollution at night."
However, the comment does not provide the
full citation, giving the reader no way to consult this study. Furthermore, studies that
are not accessible to the general public, such
as the Haim and Bogard sources, cannot
qualify as evidence since neither the City
Council nor any of the other participants in the process have the opportunity to actually
review them. Given misrepresentations by the
commenter about sources that are available,
such as the Naggar study, there is fair cause
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 65
19309265.12
6. The pleas of Public Health researchers to minimize LAN. Multitudinous, independent,
scientific, peer-reviewed studies, published
throughout the last 30-plus years, have
identified links between LAN and circadian
disruption (a.k.a. Daily Rhythm Disruption) to behavioral changes, sleep disorders, diabetes,
depression, obesity, heart disease, Mild
Cognitive Impairment, MCI (a transitional
phase between normal aging and dementia)
and cancers of the breast, prostate, colon and
rectum. Of the above-listed maladies, the last
four now have, multiple, well-established
causal connections between those cancers
and LAN.
Such studies implore:
policy-makers should take effective measures
to curb the surging light pollution at night. --
Chen et al. (2022) and,
immed iate measures should be taken to
reduce artificial light at night. -- Al Nagger &
Anil (2016) and,
Regulations on nighttime advertising (which is virtually non-existent today) should also be
implemented and switching off such
illumination can contribute to the most
important aims of decreasing light pollution [...]
Public policy makers should also
be convinced to curb the wide scale
introduction of short wavelength [i.e. blue-rich]
illumination. -- Haim & Portnov (2013)
7. Objective, informed and expert opinion --
unmotivated by commercial interests -- delivered in good faith and with genuine
concern, by national and international
organizations (e.g. American Medical
Association; Sleep Foundation; World Health
Organization, WHO; www.breastcancer.org).
8. Environmental and other concerns
expressed by advocacy groups (e.g. Audubon
to doubt the credibility of the commenters
assertions about what these studies say.
The comment also claims that national and
international organizations, such as the Sleep
Foundation and breastcancer.org, provide
expert opinion on this issue, but fail to provide any citation or support for this claim.
Another example of Dr . Lynam's failure to
properly support his claims is that he provides
no authority for his statement that light at
night causes depression. There is no
evidence cited for this claim.
On the whole, the claims concerning disease
are devoid of evidence. They are
sensationalistic and lack scientific scaffolding.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 66
19309265.12
Society; Sierra Club; No Digital Billboards San
Jose).
9. The majority of independently gathered
public comment (including Gilroy residents
and those from `out- of-town').
5 A document central to the present appeal is a
(17 February 2023) letter from Hanson
Bridgett LLP, representing Outfront Media Inc. (Marciniak & Dao 2023, hereafter MD23).
Much of the following addresses statements
made therein. §2 discusses the impact of LAN
upon UCO/Lick. §3 (and appendix) discusses
LAN and human health, §4 discusses LAN
and the City's General Plan, §5 discusses Regional proliferation of LAN, §6 deals with
allusions to those from ‘out-of-town’, §7
provides conclusions. References are
appended.
This comment outlines the issues raised by
Dr. Lynam in this letter, these issues are
addressed in more detail below.
6 2. Light At Night, LAN (a.k.a. Light Pollution)
and the University of California
Observatories/Lick
Observatory, UCO/Lick
UCO/Lick endorses the sentiment to:
encourage the City to rely on the science-
based analysis. -- MD23
Since before the 1970s, the growth of LAN
has increasingly negatively impacted Lick
Observatory's operation and mission. In visible
light, LAN chiefly results from the physics of
photon scattering by ever-present atmospheric
aerosols (e.g. water vapor, particles). Scattering is responsible for twilights, renders
clear daytime skies as blue and cloudy skies
as gray. Applying the physics of aerosol
scattering to model sky brightness arising from
lighting use can be enormously complex. A
physical model describing light pollution via
interaction of artificial light with the
atmosphere was developed by Garstang
throughout the 1980s. Garstang (1989a)
includes some simplifying assumptions and is the most widely-adopted description. Using
Garstang's model, Duriscoe et al. (2018)
quantify the effects of metropolitan light
For a discussion of the impacts of the Project
on Lick Observatory, see Responses #A1, 2,
10, and 13.
While Dr. Lynam has cited to several studies
regarding the expansion of light at night,
none of these support his argument that this
Project will have a significant or cumulative
impact on the environment.
Dr. Lynam relies upon a United Nations
declaration that an unpolluted night sky
should be an inalienable human right, and
claims that the MND should have taken this
declaration into account. However, this declaration expressly acknowledges light
pollution as separate from environmental
rights. As the Appellant's have explained, an
MND is only required to evaluate impacts on
the environment.
The commenter has already acknowledged
no scientific study has demonstrated a link
between digital signage and health impacts.
The remainder of his comment consists of rhetoric and does not merit further response.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 67
19309265.12
impacting astronomical sites up to 200{300 km
away. Beyond highlighting the observation of incr easing LAN as witnessed from Mount
Hamilton (as well as in the vicinity of most
conurbations in the industrialized world),
multiple independent scientific studies,
published in peer-reviewed journals, have been previously cited (Lynam 2023), not
merely describing, but quantifying the
acceleration of LAN and its effect on
observatories -- including, specifically, Lick
Observatory (e.g. Green et al. 2022).
However, in attempting to refute mature
science, MD23 exhibit a rst instance of failing
to introduce any scientific article | or even
empirical evidence. Therefore, MD belie the
sentiment to `rely on the science-based analysis'. In the absence of any scientific
foundation, MD23 meekly proffer the
conjecture that scientists have:
misused existing studies. -- MD23
Those, supposedly ‘misused’, studies find that:
Eighty per cent of children born in the western
world today will never know a night dark enough
that they can see the Milky Way. -- (Bogard
2013)
Mount Hamilton remains one of the few
locatio ns in the San Francisco Bay Area
where one can observe the Milky Way with the
naked eye. However, the acceleration of light
pollution is diminishing those opportunities and
eroding researchers ability to detect
astronomical sources, compelling longer exposure times and thus reducing efficiency.
The United Nations has declared:
An unpolluted night sky that allows the enjoyment and contemplation of the firmament
should be considered an inalienable right of
humankind equivalent to all other
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 68
19309265.12
environmental, social, and cultural rights. --
(Bogard 2013)
This declaration was not addressed in the
Initial Study/Mitigated Negative Declaration,
IS/MND.
UCO/Lick has never sought to belabor local
authorities with the special interests of
observatories, astronomers and/or dark-sky
advocates. It is acknowledged that the
astronomical community's desire to halt (or
even reverse) the pervasive regional
encroachment of LAN represents the special
interests of a minority group. There are more
powerful arguments opposing the introduction
new sources of LAN. It would be redundant to
discuss concerns of blight, driver distraction, and impacts of LAN on fauna and flora in this
contribution, when more comprehensive,
informed and expert contributions have been
contributed by concerned groups and
individuals. Therefore, the most compelling
case against LAN (not discussed elsewhere)
arises when LAN is considered as a public
health issue.
7 3. Light At Night, LAN (a.k.a. Light Pollution)
and Human Health
Humans are highly sensitive to LAN, which
has the power to dramatically, negatively, affect circadian rhythms. Circadian rhythms
control aspects of physiology, behavior,
metabolism, hormone (e.g. melatonin)
secretion, body temperature and blood
pressure. Every major disease is associated to
some extent with short sleep/long light. Sleep
disorders are now arguably the most prevalent
health concern in the industrialized world. A
multitude of studies have made a case for a
link between light at night and cancer, especially hormone influenced cancers such
as breast and prostate. It is the shorter
wav elengths of light (i.e. blue) that most affect
melatonin production in mammals. In
consequence, LEDs with their preponderance of blue emission are of most concern.
For a discussion of the health impacts of the
Project, please see Response #A9 above.
Throughout his comment, Dr. Lynam makes
bald assertions with no citation to evidence. For instance, there is no citation to his
statement that "[i]t is the shorter wavelengths
of light (i.e. blue) that most a
affect melatonin production in mammals."
Even if that were true, as Response #A13
explains, the electronic billboards minimize
the use of blue light, as compared to standard
LEDs. So Dr. Lynam's imprecise
generalizations to standard LEDs, and his
concerns regarding an excess of blue light, are inapplicable here.
As discussed above, in this comment Dr.
Lynam admits that his claims that a digital
billboard will cause cancer and other diseases are irresponsible. He declares, with
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 69
19309265.12
In seeking to refute the link between LAN and its detrimental effects on human health MD23
are mistaken. They (rightfully) accuse:
The claim that a digital billboard will cause
cancer and other disease is an irresponsible claim. -- MD23
Agreed, to make such a claim certainly would
be irresponsible. However, no such claim has
ever been made. No study has concluded that
digital signs cause disease and other
maladies. MD23 have mistakenly conflated the
presented facts to arrive at their own
conjecture. In terms of the threat to public
health, dark-sky advocates have consistently
reiterated three, unassailable, truths:
(i) Billboards (and particularly the blue-rich
LEDs contained in digital/electronic devices)
contribute disproportionately to LAN via
multiple mechanisms (scattered light, lateral
illumination, large surface area, high
elevation).
(ii) LAN is increasing at an accelerating rate,
particularly so in metropolitan areas of the
industrialized world.
(iii) LAN is linked to a number of ailments,
including cancer and particularly hormonally-
induced cancers.
It is unclear whether the MD23 conflation and
accusation manifest an effort to construct a
straw man argument by an intentional
misreading, or a forgivable error overlooking
30-plus years of research linking LAN and
multiple human ailments -- most securely, hormonal cancers such as breast and prostate
(as well as a general decline in immune
system functioning). Here, MD23 exhibit a
second instance of failing to introduce any
scientific study to refute the links between LAN (especially blue-rich light produced by LEDs)
and human health. Instead, they elect to
contest a single study (of many) presented in
emphasis, that "no such claim has ever been
made" and that "[n]o study has concluded that digital signs cause disease and other
maladies." Despite his assertions that there is
no evidence that a digital billboard will cause
cancer and other diseases, Dr. Lynam goes
on to contradict himself with several assertions that the billboard will contribute to
"Light At Night" or "LAN," and that there are
"causal connections" to cancer and disease.
While the comment has identified causal
pathways between night at light and disease,
it has not, and cannot, identify a causal
pathway between the Project and any
negative health impacts. The commenter
even acknowledges as much, quite
expressly.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 70
19309265.12
previous correspondence (Lynam 2023),
stating:
The only study that was cited to for these
purposes was the article entitled Artificial Light
at Night and Cancer: Global Study article by
Al-Naggar, A., Anil, S. -- MD23
The above statement is veritably untrue (see
below). Returning to the truth, MD23 add
(quite rightly):
that a single article is not substantial evidence.
-- MD23
Yet, despite this, MD23 proceed critique only
this single article, thereby hoisting themselves
by their own petard.
The truth is a previous written contribution
(Lynam 2023) provided multiple citations, of
which Al Nagger & Anil (2016) merely offers a
concise, unambiguous conclusion, echoed in
more recent studies:
[A]LAN is significantly correlated for all forms
of cancer including lung, breast, colorectal and
prostate cancer. Immediate measures should be taken to reduce artificial light at night in the
main cities around the world. -- Al Nagger &
Anil (2016)
For brevity, the same written contribution (as
testament to the maturity of the more-than-
three-decades-old body of work establishing
the link between LAN and human hormonal
cancers) also cited, in plain English:
Bogard (2013) and scholarly references therein Since these citations have been
ignored, resulting in MD23's false assertions,
one is compelled to provide a summary (see
appendix).
MD23 (again, quite rightly) proclaim:
It is a fallacy of logic to indulge in the idea that
correlation even implies causation. -- MD23
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 71
19309265.12
This exposes ignorance of the cited literature, which provides at least two clear (and several
more convoluted) causality pathways between
LAN and cancer (e.g. Figure 15.1 of Haim, A.,
Portnov, B. A., 2013):
• Via circadian disruptions to secretion of
melatonin by the pineal gland.
• Via increased levels of stress hormones and
energy expenditure. As additional energy is
allocated to maintain homeostasis, it may
weaken the response of the immune system
thus, increasing vulnerability to pathogens and
carcinogens.
As a result of these readily exposed mistakes,
conflations, untruths and ignorant statements, few of the assertions contained in the MD23
discussion of LAN and Public Health can be
considered reliable science-based analysis.
8 4. Light At Night, LAN (a.k.a. Light Pollution)
and the City of Gilroy General Plan 2040
The letter of appeal asserts:
the light contribution from the proposed
display would not cumulate with other sources
-- MD23
Somewhat frustratingly, this is a re-emergent
re-framing of a previous false statement,
claiming electronic billboards:
will NOT contribute to light pollution as
opponents claim. -- Conrotto (2023)
Scientifically, these repeated claims are simply
preposterous. The laws of physics -- and
particularly the phenomenon of Rayleigh
scattering -- dictate (as previously stated in a
written contribution to the Planning
Commission):
Any light source which interacts with the
atmosphere contributes an additive effect to
the phenomenon of light pollution.-- Lynam
(2023)
For a discussion of the Project's compliance
with the General Plan, please see Response
#I and see the February 17, 2023 Appeal of
Planning Commission’s February 2, 2023
Denial of Ordinance Change, pp. 14-22.
In order to make his counter-argument to the
appeal, Dr. Lynam inaccurately represents
the Appellant's statements in the appeal.
According to Dr. Lynam, the appeal claims
"electronic billboards: will NOT contribute to light pollution." This is not so, the appeal
states "contribution from the proposed display
would not cumulate with other sources to
produce a significant impact." While the
billboard will contribute, this contribution will
be incremental, and therefore will not be
significant.
Again, the comment makes broad
generalizations regarding LEDs and blue-light while ignoring the specifics of the proposed
electronic billboard. Comments based on
speculation, rather than fact, cannot be relied
upon as substantial evidence of a significant
impact. Public Resources Code, §§ 21080(e) and 21082.2(c).
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 72
19309265.12
Less intuitive (but similarly ignorant of physics)
is the assertion that:
The billboard [...] would reduce light pollution
and glare by angling each of the individual
LEDs
downwards [...] in contrast to a traditionally illuminated display. -- MD23
A brightness reduction of 10 (a multiplicative
factor) is claimed. This claim may be true if
only the limited
wavelengths of traditional illuminations are
considered. However, the claim ignores
physics (also explained in Lynam 2023): LEDs
introduce a preponderance of blue light,
absent from traditional illumination.
Furthermore, Rayleigh scattering (the dominant physical process contributing to sky
glow) exhibits not a multiplicative contribution,
but a power law wavelength dependence (of
order 4). LED illuminations emit light across
more wavelengths and bluer wavelengths.
They are far more scattered than traditional
illumination.
While the above (Conrotto; MD23) claims are
demonstrably unphysical (and, for the third time, fail to meet the requirements of a
‘science-based analysis’) the following claim
simply strains credulity:
nothing about the Proposed Ordinance
frustrates or is incompatible with the goals and
policies of
the General Plan -- MD23
Even if one suspends disbelief in an effort to
entertain the claim, it can surely only be
compatible with the letter, and not the intent, of the General Plan. The City of Gilroy's own
guiding principles (e.g. Public Safety) and
multiple elements outlined in the City of Gilroy
2040 General Plan (e.g. LU 8.13; NCR 1.10)
explicitly advocate measures to limit light pollution from outdoor sources.
While Land Use policy 8.13 does encourage measures to limit light pollution from outdoor
sources, the Project is nevertheless
consistent with this policy because the MND
concluded that future electronic billboards
would not create a substantial change in illumination levels due to baseline light
source. For further discussion of the Project's
compliance with Land Use policy 8.13, see
the February 17, 2023 Appeal of Planning
Commission’s February 2, 2023 Denial of
Ordinance Change, p. 19.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 73
19309265.12
9 5. Light At Night, LAN (a.k.a. Light Pollution):
Regional Proliferation
The appellants seek to assure and re-assure
us that the City of Gilroy would have the
unassailable police power to enact and
enforce its limitation on the number of billboards. However, it is noteworthy that
almost every reiteration of these assurances is
carefully qualified by including language
indicating that this power is applicable only
within the City.
The acceleration of LAN resulting from the
proliferation of outdoor sources (including
digital billboards) trespasses beyond the
jurisdiction of individual cities. LAN is a
regional scourge.
Regardless of whether the present appeal
succeeds or fails in Gilroy, it does not
guarantee that commercial interests will not
continue the trend of proposing similar
ordinance modications in neighboring
settlements -- ultimately resulting in an
unbroken sequence of electronic billboards,
punctuating every two miles (or less) along the
Highway 101 corridor from south of Salinas to north of San Francisco. To deny the present
appeal is arguably the City of Gilroy's best
opportunity to heed the intentions and
warnings of the City's own
guiding principles, Public Health professionals,
dark-sky advocates and others to mitigate,
curb, limit, reduce or reverse this regional
trend.
Disturbingly, in seeking to reassure us, the
appellants list Californian cities that have adopted billboard ordinances similar (but not
wholly) to the one they prescribe for Gilroy (El
Monte, Bell Gardens, Buena Park, Hawthorne,
Pico Revera). All of the cities that the
appellants cite as a models for Gilroy to emulate are located within (and contribute to)
one of the most light-polluted regions on earth,
the Los Angeles basin.
In this comment, Dr. Lynam seems to oppose
potential light pollution from billboards in other jurisdictions, arguing that this is outside
the police power of the City. It is true that the
City Council of the City of Gilroy is not able to
enact laws outside of its own jurisdiction. The
Appellant has never stated, or tried to imply, otherwise.
The comment also seems to claim that the
City's approval of the Project will result in
neighboring towns adopting ordinances
allowing electronic billboards, and the artificial
light from these billboards will impact the City
of Gilroy. In fact, the towns closest to Gilroy,
Morgan Hill, Milpitas, and San Jose all
already allow electronic billboards.
Regardless, these claims by Dr. Lynam are speculative.
Again, Dr. Lynam relies on statements
regarding the City of San Jose's electronic
billboard ordinance. As the comment states,
regulations involving billboards are not "one-
size -fits-all." Similarly, the oppositions to San
Jose's electronic billboard ordinance do not
apply to Gilroy's ordinance, and the City
Council has the discretion to make up their own minds and listen to their own
constituents.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 74
19309265.12
For the majority of these cities, if the relevant
municipal codes and ordinances applying to signs are inspected, one finds common
language, often referring to being `in
accordance with [sections of] the California
Business and Professions Code, CBPC'. It
would be a mistake to assume that the CBPC is a homogeneous, one-size -fits-all, set of
provisions. It contains numerous clauses and
exemptions, predominantly in-and-around Los
Angeles. In many contexts, the CBPC
establishes regulations demand that:
the advertising display is authorized by, or in
accordance with, an ordinance [...] adopted by
the
City that regulates advertising displays by
identifying the specific displays or establishing regulations that include, at a minimum, all of
the following:
(A) Number of signs and total signage area
allowed.
(B) Maximum individual signage area.
(C) Minimum sign separation.
(D) Illumination restrictions and regulations,
including signage refresh rate, scrolling, and
brightness. (E) Illuminated sign hours of operation.
These provisions align both with the guidelines
to minimize damage to dark skies, developed
by the IDA2 and the pleas of public health
researchers to reduce, curb, mitigate or
reverse the proliferation of LAN. However, the
appellants prescription for Gilroy
conspicuously (and in the writer's experience,
extraordinarily) excludes measures such as
regulating illuminated sign hours of operation.
Furthermore, the ordinances in these cities
(e.g. El Monte; Hawthorne) recognize:
billboards can have significant influence on the
City's visual character, and can, without appropriate
control, create or contribute to visual blight.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 75
19309265.12
Not uncommonly, these ordinances contain
incentives motivating (in the case of El Monte):
an existing billboard or digital billboard in
existence [...] be relocated and rebuilt only
within [a]
Billboard Zone.
Bell Gardens requires a `tear-down' ratio:
remove two existing legal nonconforming
billboards in order to construct one new
billboard
In the City of San Jose, during the (15
February 2022) meeting of the City Council,
then Mayor Liccardo observed:
The public hates billboards. If we took a poll
on the Council, I think it would be 11:0. We
would be
happy to have the City without any billboards.
There is overwhelming public opposition [...]
We'd love to tear-down all of those billboards
tomorrow.
In addition to adopting the IDA guidelines, the
City of San Jose invoked public outcry as a vehicle to expand the proposed conventional
versus electronic billboard tear-down ratio
from 4:1 to 6:1.
10 6. `Out-of-town'
Finally, proponents demean themselves by
resorting to allusions to `out-of-town' and non-
resident opponents. Such non-arguments
have been multiply deployed -- subtly and not-
so-subtly -- in their so-called `spirited' debate.
Any entity expressing such views disgraces
itself. That a multi-national organization should
align itself with such parochial views is oxymoronic. The assumption is that the
appellants seek to diminish experience and
discount informed and expert opinion, freely
given, volunteered in good faith and backed by
genuine concern. In our most beloved and
In this comment, Dr. Lynam appears to argue
that out-of-towners should have just as much
say in the decisions of the City as its citizens.
Clearly, the opinion of the citizens of Gilroy
carries much greater weight than the opinion
of outsiders. The voters of the City of Gilroy
should have the say-so on whether the
community wants to change its ordinance.
The citizens of Gilroy do not need a fairy
godmother or godfather from out of town to rescue them from anything.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 76
19309265.12
enduring tales, fairy Godmothers and
Godfathers invariably arrive from `out-of -town'.
Which law prevents any person from harboring
affinities, affections and aspirations for Gilroy?
What criteria and thresholds are to be met in
order to be considered `residents of Gilroy or the surrounding area'? Who holds the right to
set such criteria? How far away does
someone have to relocate from their birthplace
to be considered out-of-town -- San Martin or
Singapore? By dint of some unwritten edict,
are those from `out-of-town' now barred from
any community engagement? By
extrapolation, proponents thus preclude those
from ‘out-of-town' from making charitable
donations to Gilroy's deserving causes. Are
those not resident of Gilroy or the surrounding area required to erase from their memories the
people of Gilroy with whom they have had
enjoyable interactions? By whose decree must
those not resident of Gilroy or the surrounding
area, who fled the August 2020 SCU complex
wild re as it set their homes aflame, now un-
feel and abandon their fondness for the City of
Gilroy and the tenderness shown to them by
its people, who offered succor and refuge?
11 7. Conclusion
It's happening: Estimates suggest that Light At
Night, LAN (a.k.a. light pollution) is
accelerating at a rate that out-paces that of population growth
(Gaston & Sanchez de Miguel 2022). It's
LEDs: LEDs, their preponderance of blue light
and the outdoor devices that use them
contribute disproportionately to LAN. We're
sure: Decades of objective, peer-reviewed
scientific (astronomical and public health)
studies agree. It's bad (and getting worse): In
1989, of 17 major (exclusively US-based)
observatories, Lick was ranked among the top 3 most heavily light-polluted astronomical sites
(Garstang 1989b) at visible wavelengths. In
2022, in a list of 23 major observatories
worldwide, Lick was cited as the most affected
astronomical site (Green et al. 2022) in the visible regime. LAN, via circadian disruption, is
This comment summarizes the issues raised
previously, which are addressed above. No
further response is necessary.
Dr. Lynam claims that the existing zoning ordinance is the "longstanding will of the
people," however, the will of the people can
change as society evolves. Additionally, there
is nothing wrong with being "commercially
motivated" when it results in economic
benefits to local citizens. The economic
health of Gilroy's business community does
matter.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 77
19309265.12
linked with a profusion of human ailments, not
limited to behavioral changes, sleep disorders (arguably the most prevalent health concern in
the industrialized world), diabetes, depression,
obesity, heart disease, Mild Cognitive
Impairment, MCI and cancers of the lung,
colon, rectum. LAN has multiple causal connections to breast and prostate cancer. We
can x it: Take measures to reduce the surging
light pollution at night. Regulate nighttime
advertising. Switching off such illumination can
contribute to the most important aims of
decreasing light pollution. Curb the wide scale
introduction of short wavelength (blue-rich)
illumination.
The commercially-motivated appellants seek
to overturn the long-standing will of the people of Gilroy (enshrined in the City's guiding
principles) in an effort to acquire a digital
billboard monopoly. Doing so shall exacerbate
the accelerating scourge of regional light
pollution. The appellants offer no contest to
the fact LEDs (and the devices that employ
them) pollute across the broad visual
spectrum and emit a preponderance of short
wavelength/blue light. Electing to free
themselves of the encumbrance of scientific rigor, the appellants have ignored the laws of
physics (specifically the phenomenon of
scattering), repeatedly made some claims that
are unphysical and others that strain credulity.
Responding to peer-reviewed scientific
evidence, quantifying the growing impact of
LAN on astronomy in general -- and Lick
Observatory in particular -- absent any
supporting source – the appellants level the
vacuous charge of `misuse'. Again, in the
absence of objective studies to support their case, the appellants proffer unfounded
conjecture. They have been consistently and
extraordinarily insensitive to appeals to
mitigate LAN by adopting IDA guidance
(backed by decades of astronomical and public health research, as well as the City's
guiding principles). Mistakenly, they have
conflated facts and untruthfully
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 78
19309265.12
denied the existence of a multitude of
citations. They arrive at narrowly-drawn conclusions, based on sparsely-selected (and
in one case, single) articles. They have
propounded false assertions and downplayed
(willfully or accidentally) the links between
LAN and human health and the causal connections established between LAN and
some cancers. Not once, not twice, but thrice,
the content of the appeal has failed to meet
the standard required of objective science-
based analysis. The appellants prescribe for
Gilroy an ordinance that seeks to emulate one
of the most light-polluted regions on earth.
Assurances are carefully qualified by within
the city, thus disregarding the regional
trespass of LAN. Measures to regulate, for
example, illuminated sign hours of operation, are omitted | as is the suggestion of
revocations and/or tear-downs. At no stage
has the adoption of IDA guidance been
entertained.
Therefore, the City Council is implored to
respect the considered judgment of their
expert panel of advisers, the Planning
Commission. Please seize this opportunity to
abide by the intentions of the City's own guiding principles. Deny the ordinance
change.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 79
19309265.12
Very truly yours,
Hanson Bridgett LLP
Na talie Kirkish
Associate
Huong (Jenny) Dao
Associate
HJD : NCK
CC: Cindy McCormick
City of Gilroy Customer Services Manager
7351 Rosanna Street
Gilroy, California 95020
cindy.mccormick@cityofgilroy.org
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 80
19309265.12
Attachment A
Illustration of distance between Lick Observatory and potential site of new digital display
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 81
19309265.12
Arrows in both maps indicate direction of Lick Observatory
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 82
19309265.12
Attachment B
Photos of Appellant's proposed sign location along the City's Auto Row, a
commercial/industrial area with existing signage and lights.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 83
19309265.12
Attachment C
\
Photo 1: View from Lick Observatory facing south, towards Gilroy.
Photo 2: Satellite map of nighttime light within 25 miles of the Lick Observatory.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 84
19309265.12
Attachment D
Location of Sargent Ranch in relation to City of Gilroy.
Mayor Blankley
Gilroy City Council
Page 85
19309265.12
Photo 1: from highway segment adjacent to northernmost portion of Sargent Ranch.
The City of Gilroy is not visible due to intervening topography.
Photo 2: from City's municipal limit; the Appellant's proposed sign location would not be visible, as approximately 1.5 miles separates the two points.