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Just look around the streets of Houston and you’ll see them.

Boxes and boxes for papers and magazines—sometimes dozens crowding the same sidewalk.

Some have news.

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City comes up with a proposed ordinance to regulate news boxes on Houston streets

Some have nothing but ads.

And some sitting empty have nothing at all.

A survey indicated more than 50 publications are distributed in those kinds of boxes around downtown Houston. 

Downtown boosters have complained about it for years.  Now a city council committee has come up with a proposed ordinance that would regulate news boxes on Houston streets.

“Visually, you see clutter.  But by the same token, it also becomes a safety issue,” said Councilmember Pam Holm.

The proposed news rack rules would require city permits and call for abandoned racks to be removed.

The boxes would also have to conform to size restrictions.

And they’d all have to be the same color, forest green.

So some newspapers like USA Today argue they’d lose an important marketing tool.          

“Our news rack is our trademark.  Our white news rack, television style news rack is a registered trademark for USA Today.  Thus, we lose our trademark and our branding,” said Randy Schawe with USA Today.

Councilmembers who generally like the ordinance showed off pictures of how it’s done in other cities  and wondered whether Houston’s going far enough.

“I just want to go one step further and really include aesthetics, really see what individual businesses want,” said Councilmember Toni Lawrence.

In a city that’s trying to clean up its streets, the people on the street may soon read all about new rules on news racks.