Wednesday, May 7th, 2008 ::: Law: Strategic Media Suit

Strategic Media, a company that operates 35 illegal billboards around the City of Toronto but doesn’t have one legal sign, has now sued the City of Toronto over billboard enforcement, making it the second billboard company to sue the City after Titan Outdoor launched its action earlier this year. However, this marks the first time that the sign by-laws of Etobicoke and North York are being putatively challenged.

Strategic is the only billboard company in Toronto that does not operate nameplates under their signs. It is a safe bet that a large-format vinyl sign without a nameplate in downtown Toronto is generally a Strategic Media sign.

Here is the suit [PDF] filed on April 18 by Stan Makuch of Cassels Brock:

Unfortunately, we are of the opinion that the City Solicitor is inviting these lawsuits with her devil-may-care attitude to billboard enforcement. After Titan Outdoor sued the City, City Solicitor Anna Kinastowski’s granting Titan temporary, de-facto variances to maintain all of their illegal billboards for as long as Titan maintains its suit against the City, no matter how settled the matters of law are. The deal was never disclosed to city councillors and was written without the advice or consent of City Council; it was also written after Toronto and East York Community Council explicitly rejected variances for Titan’s signs and after City Council directed illegal signs in the downtown core to be removed “as soon as possible.”

We only found out about the deal with Titan after reading affidavit material submitted by the City in court.

Under these circumstances, a billboard company would be pretty stupid not to sue the City of Toronto, given that the City Solicitor will allow them to earn cash flow from their illegal activity so long as they maintain legal proceedings.

Strategic Media’s lawsuit is a subterfuge. Its purpose is not to quash the signs by-laws in court, but to obtain the same sweetheart deal that Titan obtained out of court - to obtain the temporary variances from the City Solicitor. It remains to be seen if the temporary variances granted to Titan Outdoor will also be granted to Strategic Media, given that Strategic has a much dirtier portfolio. We strongly urge the law department to implement the immensely powerful legal tools available to the City to remove Strategic Media’s illegal billboards immediately and to reject Strategic’s request for variances.

Unfortunately, in a City where officials too often ignore the law in favour of the billboard industry, we don’t have high hopes.

Strategic Media’s most infamous billboard is the one at Highway 401 and the Don Valley Parkway, at 135 Fenelon Drive. On May 29, 2007, City Council directed staff to enforce the law against the sign and remove it. Paul Moloney then wrote this article about the case: “Attack on the 50-foot woman,” wherein the City’s budget chief was quoted as saying: “I hope you’re not looking at boobies when you have to get out of the HOV lane,” referring to the H&M above.

The article noted that the sign makes $600,000 per year. Rather than removing the sign with contracted staff, which the City can do at any time, the City obtained a $1,000 fine against the $600,000 billboard.

After the jump, is a sample of some illegal billboards operated by Strategic Media Inc:

55 Plywood Place

491 Lawrence West

128 Avenue Road

208 Bloor Street West

334 Bloor Street West

559 College

796 College

544 King Street West

128 Peter Street

592 Queen Street West

940 Queen Street West

185 Spadina Ave

285 Spadina Ave

81 Victoria

651 Queen Street West

1922 Yonge Street

640 College

452 Richmond Street West

235 Danforth

441 Queen Street West

250 Eglinton West

549 College Street

460 King West

1055 Yonge

3145 Yonge