Plethora of signs and complaints caused department to remove them

Only a few days prior to Centre Wellington Town­ship passing its sign bylaw, the roads department swooped down on over 400 illegal signs and hauled them away.

That was one of the con­cerns of the township Chamber of Commerce when president Michael Weinstein attended the council meeting the night the bylaw was debated on July 12.

Mayor Joanne Ross-Zuj said in an interview on July 24 there was a good reason the township acted to remove the signs.

She said there was “a plethora of signs that sprung up” seemingly overnight and the township received com­plaints about them.

Public Works Director Ken Elder said the road crews seiz­ed about 400 signs, with nearly half of them touting an event at the Elora Centre for the Arts.

Ross-Zuj said signs were planted in the roundabout at the south end of Metcalfe Street  in Elora, and she heard com­plaints that someone had even placed signs at the Elora ceno­taph.

“It caught the attention of the residents when the whole downtown was flooded,” Ross-Zuj said.

She added that many visi­t­ors to Elora love to take pictures of the village, and the sign bylaw enables them to do that without signs cluttering the views.

Economic development offi­cer Dave Rushton said that with the new bylaw in place, people holding events will be allowed no more than a dozen directional signs and those can be put in place only three days prior to the event.

Ross-Zuj reiterated coun­cil’s promise that it will ease into the bylaw with its en­forcement, and give warnings rather than lay charges.

However, with the com­plaints, she said the township had to act and remove many illegal signs.