September 25, 2025 by Michael Armstrong

Special to the Seward Folly

At its regular meeting on Monday, the Seward City Council introduced an ordinance revising and amending its sign code. It also introduced two ordinances regarding land use: Ordinance 2025-014, adding definitions for animal shelters and veterinary hospitals, and Ordinance 2025-016, adding definitions for dwellings, apartments, commercial buildings and mixed-use development.  All three ordinances were on the consent agenda and passed without objection. Public hearings and further action on the ordinances will be held at the next meeting on Oct. 13.

In an agenda statement accompanying the sign ordinance, Community Development Director Daniel Meuninck wrote that it came about after citizen complaints regarding temporary signs, particularly “feather” signs, defined in the ordinance as “any temporary, portable, animated sign made of lightweight materials that is prone to move in the wind.” Current code treats feather signs the same as flags or banner signs. The new ordinance also addresses temporary, off-premise signs and inconsistencies in the regulation of awnings.

The city attorney reviewed Seward’s sign code for compliance with a 2015 U.S. Supreme Court decision, Reed v. Town of Gilbert. In that decision, the Supreme Court found unconstitutional the sign regulations in Gilbert, Arizona, after a church challenged enforcement of restrictions on temporary signs directing people to services. Gilbert had looser restrictions on political or ideological signs.

Ordinance 2025-015 removes entirely the definition of political signs from the code and removes political signs — and accompanying restrictions — from being allowed without a permit. It also adds a section defining banners as being secured on all four corners. To avoid confusion, the  revision removes mention of flags in that definition and adds a new section  defining flags as “a piece of cloth or similar material, attached at one edge to a pole and used as the symbol or emblem of a country or institution, or as a marker or signal; and in no way can be construed as advertising.” An existing section of the sign code allows flags to be flown without a permit. That would allow, for example, a pink flag flown as awareness of breast cancer.

The revised code also further defines “snipe” signs as a sign “illegally placed in the public right-of-way or on a property that is not the site of the business or event.”

In citizen comments, Randy McFarland said “the definition of the snipe sign should be expanded and clarified a bit.” He cited parking restriction signs that businesses might put up as an example.

Council Member Randy Wells asked City Manager Kat Sorensen for clarification on that point, such as signs at the harbor.

“There is a variation, you can put a sign on your property that dictates parking on that property, but if it’s interpreted as a sign in a public area to dictate that, it’s different, which is where that snipe sign comes from in the code,” Sorensen said.

Council Member Robert Barnwell also asked about restrictions on campaign signs. Sorensen said that issue will be part of the discussion on the revised ordinance.

“Part of the sign code ordinance that we’ll be seeing during public hearing next meeting is to address the fact that in our sign code, there is, there are currently instances where we are dictating what a sign can say, which is an infraction upon freedom of speech,” she said.

According to an agenda statement from Meuninck, the ordinance on veterinary hospitals came about after a Soldotna veterinary hospital started offering mobile veterinary services at the animal shelter. The shelter has a conditional-use permit in the Institutional and Resource Management zoning district, but animal hospitals aren’t allowed there. The new ordinance would allow animal hospitals in the Institutional district and add a definition for them.

For Ordinance 2025-016, in an agenda statement Meuninck wrote that there is a lack of clarity “regarding regulations for mixed-use buildings and mixed-use development” and that the current code does not define “mixed-use buildings” or “mixed-use development.” Some districts allow apartments outright while others require conditional use permits. The ordinance revision would define mixed-use development in code and permit apartments in mixed-use buildings outright in the Central Business and Harbor Commercial zoning districts.

The issue came about in discussions at the Seward Planning and Zoning Commission about mixed-use development and parking regulations. Meuninck wrote that parking requirements for mixed-use buildings and mixed-use development would be considered as part of a broader review of parking underway.

Michael Armstrong is a retired Homer News reporter and editor. Reach him at wordfolk@gmail.com.

The Seward Folly publisher Robert Barnwell is a current member of the Seward City Council, but he did not participate in the editing of this story.