HOUSTON -- Old news is piling up in a Houston storage lot, and now a new ordinance will allow city employees to start clearing out the clutter.
Ever since the city began enforcing a “newsrack ordinance” in early 2008, inspectors have been tagging and collecting newsracks that are not in compliance with the rules: They must be metal, secured with a 95 pound concrete base, and painted only one color – forest green.
So far, inspectors have found 4,052 newsracks along city streets that are in violation of the rules, and hauled 968 of them to the city’s storage lot on Center St. near downtown.
When they passed the rules, City Council members expected that newspaper owners would want to get their newsracks back – but 281 of them remained unclaimed for months, cluttering the warehouse. It’s why the Council changed the rules yet again on Tuesday, giving inspectors the authority to discard the offending newsracks 30 days after bringing them to the storage lot. Council members declined to add a $75 violation fee and $5/day storage fee, which inspectors had originally suggested.
“The ordinance needs to be repealed,” said Sharon Lauder, who publishes the Houston Tribune. She has 65 blue plastic newsracks around town, and has filed a lawsuit to challenge the new rules. “The freedom to distribute is as important as the freedom to publish.”
Lauder has published editorials and cartoons blasting the ordinance, and estimates that purchasing new newsracks would easily break her budget. “I would have to go into debt to buy those metal boxes,” she said. “There’s not enough money.”
Toni Lawrence, who supported the ordinance in 2007 and voted for the changes this week, said she expects the city will eventually require newspaper owners to pay a fee if their newsracks are in violation. For now, she said, the city is working to set the appropriate penalty.
