After an examination of its own ordinances at the urging of a hopeful for Kootenai County sheriff, the city of Coeur d’Alene voted Tuesday night to place an indefinite moratorium on the timeframe in which candidates can erect political signs.

City code — specifically City Ordinance 15.24.270-C — previously stated that “political signs may be erected for sixty (60) days prior to the decision in which such candidates or issues are to be decided upon. Such signs shall be removed not later than the fourth day following such election. Any such signs which have not been removed by the fifth day following such decision may be removed by the city’s building official.”

In other words, until today, a political sign had a 65-day window before and immediately after an election to make its case for an issue or candidate.

John Grimm, candidate for Kootenai County sheriff, approached the council in the first moments of a Jan. 21 meeting and voiced his frustration his campaign was facing with the city’s legal department over his installation of signs four months before the May election.

“I can’t stand idly by as the First Amendment rights of the citizens of this county are being violated,” he told the council.

Grimm cited a court case — Reed v. Gilbert — that made its way to the Supreme Court, where the highest court in the land ruled that putting limitations on signs based on content represented an infringement of the property owner’s freedom of expression. The rule of thumb that emanated from Reed v. Gilbert: If you have to read the sign to determine if it violates City Code, the Code is unconstitutional.

By the end of that week, legal staff announced the city of Coeur d’Alene was suspending enforcement of the time restrictions while City Hall evaluated an update on the code. Tuesday night’s meeting established a moratorium on enforcement of the sign code, stating no legal opinion on Grimm’s assertions but recognizing what Deputy City Attorney Randy Adams called “the unsettled nature of the constitutionality of sign codes ... and time restrictions on political signs in general …”

“I don’t know if anybody noticed that we’re in an election season,” Adams said at Tuesday’s meeting to chuckles from the council, “but there are some questions about signs.”

The moratorium was not given a specific end-date while staff continues to revise the city’s sign code. Barring a reversal, the moratorium will continue while City Hall debates whether or not to scrap the time restrictions.

“We are looking to see what the trend of the courts are,” Adams explained to the council. “There are no Ninth Circuit cases. There’s no Supreme Court case. There’s no Idaho State Appellate Court cases dealing with time limits on political signs, and there are opinions on both sides.”

Grimm praised the moratorium, temporary as it may be.

“This goes beyond political campaigns,” Grimm said. “This is a First Amendment issue. I was first made aware of the city’s enforcement efforts by a citizen after he was ordered to remove a campaign sign from his front yard.”