Friday, July 25th, 2008 ::: Law: Titan Lawsuit

Today we continue our look into the documents filed in connection with the Titan Outdoor Canada Company lawsuit. Jorg Cieslok, Titan’s principal, has now filed a reply affidavit [PDF] in response to the Laughlin Affidavit and the Bain Affidavit.

One thing that strikes us in looking at these billboard lawsuits is the dramatic difference in the quality of legal talent that advertising companies in the United States are using to attack municipalities. This could be due to the fact that in the US, billboard companies hire freedom of speech lawyers; in Canada, they hire municipal lawyers, who have done zero freedom of speech work.

Let’s take a look at the affidavit:

• In response to external pressures, the City has begun to take overzealous enforcement steps against Titan and other outdoor advertisers. Paragraph 7.
• The City’s policy of using one permit which acts as both a building permit and a sign permit harms Titan’s rights when the permit is revoked. The improper “mixing” of the building and sign permit regimes creates serious legal issues when a permit is revoked, because it allows a competitor to obtain a permit to erect a sign within 60 metres. Paragraphs 9 and 10.
• Titan is raising Astral’s ability to disregard the Toronto Sign By-law in the erection of advertising copy on street furniture as an issue of competitive advantage in the marketplace that has been unilaterally accorded by the City and through which the City stands to benefit. Cieslok disagrees with Mr. Laughlin that because this type of exemption for street furniture has been the “historical norm”, that it is acceptable or fair in the context of the City’s power to regulate outdoor advertising. Paragraph 14.
• Cieslok’s involvement with the drafting of the Toronto Sign By-law in 1994 consisted of a presentation to the Committee with respect to the use of vinyl as the next generation of outdoor advertising. At that time, the use of vinyl was not widespread. Paragraph 18. [However, according to the minutes of the June 2, 1993, Sign By-Law committee meeting, in 1993 Cieslok noted that the majority of his signs are "no longer directly painted on walls but made of vinyl."]

That’s about it for Cieslok. All in all a very weak effort from a man who sold his company to Titan Outdoor and will never get paid for it because he gave Titan Outdoor certain performance requirements he just can’t meet anymore. This explains why Mr. Cieslok has recently been found telling people in his thick German accent how he wants to move into a new industry and that “IllegalSigns.ca destroyed my life.” But Jorg Cieslok’s Deutsche Mark note is short a few pfennigs because IllegalSigns.ca hasn’t begun destroying Jorg Cieslok’s life.