by Andy Langer
There
are those that
would argue some laws are made to be broken, or at least go unenforced. Until
recently, both musicians and law enforcement officials had been turning a blind
eye to sign regulations in the Austin Land Development Code that prohibits the
posting of flyers “on or over any public property.” As such, traffic boxes and
utility poles, mostly along the Drag, have become popular vehicles for posters
and flyers announcing live Austin music in clubs from the Armadillo and Vulcan
Gas Company, to Emo’s and the Electric Lounge, and everywhere in-between.
Yet after a citizen and off-duty police organized an effort to beautify the
Drag on September 30, Austin police have begun a policy of code enforcement
that has so far included the issue of citations for both the bands and the
advertised clubs. “It’s the Live Music Capital of the World, so long as you
just don’t advertise your shows,” says Skanky Yankee Tom Cuddy, who received a
citation for a $500 fine after being caught red-handed postering the drag.
“We’re just enforcing the city ordinance to the best of our ability,” says Lt.
Greg Lasley of the Baker Sector, the Austin Police branch that covers the Drag.
“The merchants and citizens are complaining about the unsightliness of every
available surface being covered with advertisements, and we spent a great deal
of effort on September 30 scraping and cleaning to bring the area back to [a]
semblance of respectability.”
Lasely says his officers have two possible courses of action for issuing
citation: catching the offending parties in the act of postering and the
after-the-fact investigation of the advertised parties. And although the former
has been a long-understood risk of the musician, as evident by the custom of
late-night poster runs, the latter police tactic has clubowners and musicians
both angry and afraid. Several clubs, Emo’s, Liberty Lunch, and the Electric
Lounge among them, have received both letters and visits from officers warning
them about posters using their names. Are the clubs, whose logos are easily
available for reprint, as accountable in the eyes of the law as the band member
who posts it?
No, says Chief Zoning Inspector Jesse Washington, whose office fields citizen
complaints on and governs over the Land Development Code. “The cases involving
the clubs are different from posters we can trace back to an employment service
or political organization which includes a phone number and is obviously
directly responsible for the posting,” says Washington. “We’ve found the clubs
themselves rarely have knowledge or authorization of posters, so we can’t
legally win a battle in court. Ultimately, there’s not much we can do except
clean the mess up.”
For the clubs’ part, most say they don’t encourage signs or pay for their
printing, and they maintain that postering is the best way for a young band
with little money or press exposure to get their name out to the public. “It’s
the single best grassroots promotional tool a young band has,” says the
Electric Lounge’s Mike Henry. “A lot of people look for flyering, in that a
band that flyers is generally motivated and a little more excited about
themselves.” But because the Land Development Code also directs a presumption
of guilt for the “primary beneficiary” of a sign, Lt. Lasely says his officers
are “acting correctly and appropriately in telling club owners they need to
stop this illegal behavior.” Lasely conceded, however, that the ultimate ruling
on the fine comes from the court system, where prosecutors recently dropped a
Class C Misdemeanor citation Flamingo Cantina owner Angela Tharp had received
for a Fuck Emos’ poster.
Still, zoning inspector Washington says each time his office spends hours
cleaning glued posters off poles, as they did in response to complaints about a
Mesch show at Liberty Lunch that was postered 20-per intersection as far away
as Palmer and Metric, his small staff is diverted from enforcing laws on zoning
and illegal business that have more bearing on the average citizen than the
sign issue. Washington’s solution calls for citizen enforcement of the laws,
i.e., active neighborhood associations ripping down posters in violation, and
the lobbying of the city council to perhaps create acceptable postering cites
along the drag, kiosks, or “if nothing but the wall of a building.” Already,
several merchants along the drag, perhaps a dozen or so that are presumably not
among the group complaining to the police, have begun providing an alternative
to the poles by making their windows more accessible to poster art.
“Window postering is a great opportunity to get around the law,” says poster
artist Craig Oelrich of Blondie’s, whose storefront is literally covered with
show flyers. “And it’s great a lot of stores are doing their part to preserve
the art. It may not be the most attractive storefront design, but more stores
should be encouraged by their patrons to allow for window postering or
designate an area of the store for it. Besides, a poster inside a window can’t
be cleaned by some frat-boy on a clean-the-poles drive.”
So what does postering’s new negative climate amount to for a town whose
classic show posters from artists like Frank Kozik and Jason Austin have become
collectibles nationwide? Perhaps not much in the long run. Even with the
Flamingo precedent and obvious questions of club accountability, most clubs and
more of the postering musicians themselves admit they’ve either temporarily
stopped postering or become substantially more cautious. But all parties,
including Inspector Washington, predict a renewal of widespread postering with
time.
“Even when we receive a complaint and we take hours to take down glue that
cost seconds to put up, it re-appears the next day,” Washington says. “And by
the next week, it almost looks worse than it originally did.” n
This article appears in October 27 • 1995 and October 27 • 1995 (Cover).