Uploaded to Flickr.com by cliff1066.
It’s an election year and democracy is in action. Unfortunately, that includes a cadre of volunteers who show up at dinner time to ring doorbells and ask residents for signatures and donations. Many also ask for permission to post some sort of sign in your yard, and some of our fellow Hill residents enjoy collecting these signs, turning their well-cared-for front lawns and gardens into political close-out sales or used car lots. But hey, that’s their choice, it’s temporary, and it’s a valid way to participate in the political process. My household hasn’t yet decided who we are supporting in the mayoral race, yet within the past month we ended up with signs in our front yard for both major Democratic candidates.
A few weeks ago a volunteer for Adrian Fenty came to our door and talked to my wife, of course during the dinner hour. Amid preparing dinner and making sure our toddler didn’t demolish the house, my wife declined making a political contribution but at some point may have heard the volunteer talk about a sign in our yard. Several days later, upon return from a weekend out of town, we found a Fenty sign in our yard. Since we didn’t discuss supporting a candidate yet I removed the sign and placed it in the trash.
This past weekend we returned home from a morning out of the house to find a “Vincent Gray for Mayor” sign in our front yard. No volunteer came to our door on Gray’s behalf to ask for support or permission to put a sign up. This sign was farther in our yard too, which to me meant someone didn’t just lean over the fence but actually came into our yard to place it. And so another sign was removed and put in the trash.
Our house sits on a corner, so I can see the logic in considering it prime political poster real estate. However, one of our bordering streets is a one-way LEAVING the District. And visibility from the cross-street is obscured by our hedges. So really, these signs are only benefiting folks commuting out to Maryland in the evenings and the residents of our own home.
So is it against the law? Sort of. The DCMR 24 code covers placing signs in public space, but “affixing signs to private property without the permission of the owner, in a manner that defaces or mars the property, may be a violation of DC Code 22-303 (Malicious Burning, Destruction, or Injury to Another’s Property).” I might think the signs deface my property, but in reality the two little holes in my lawn do nothing more than aerate the soil. So if no damage or defacing of my property has occured, I can instead turn to the DC Board of Elections and Ethics. The DCBEE offers a summary of guidelines for posting in public space but nothing really in writing about private property.
In an informal discussion among THIH writers, the Miracle of the Appearing Political Posters appears to be occurring not just at my house but all over the Hill. The Police Department’s First District List-Serve has also received reports of pranksters switching and moving signs around the Hill.
Maybe I should have kept both signs and displayed them in tandem, or better yet collect signs from all candidates running and space them out along the length of my side yard similar to the regular billboards you see for the Cotton Gin or Dirty Dick’s Crab House on the way to Virginia Beach and the Outer Banks. I could show my support for the entire political process instead of one candidate, a virtual, “Good job for running!” to every candidate.