If the Laws Aren't Enforced, Who Cares What The Laws Are?

This article from the NYCity NewsService, is about a bill being proposed to New York City which would legalize the now illegal practice called sniping. "The bill, proposed Council member Melinda Katz (D-Queens), would legalize advertising on construction sheds that cover sidewalks when buildings undergo exterior construction."

Sniping, or Wildposting, despite being illegal, is carried out on a daily basis by NPA City Outdoor and is happening while you read this. In fact, if you visit NPA's website, they will explain to you the different levels of sniping they offer, including Traditional Wildposting, Dedicated Locations, Dedicated Spectaculars, and City Wide Domination Buys. I find the language they use incredibly offensive and quite amazing. The last thing we want as a public are ads, "dominating" the city, and yet that is what is proposed.

Traditional Wildposting

Does no one realize that a law dedicated to preventing Wildposting does not matter and an article about whether the law will disappear in favor of outdoor advertising's abuse of public space is a completely moot point? If we see Wildposting all over the city on every surface, construction sites included, and the company doing the work is vocal about its practices, then for all intents and purposes these ads are not illegal to begin with. Clearly the city already condones this behavior.

I know having laws on the books criminalizing Wildposting activities would help us to combat the issue, if ever we decided it was time to clean the visual blight off our city streets. I get that. I cannot help but continue to see the law as a rouse crafted to appease the public while gifting the outdoor advertising industry full use of our public environment. This is especially true in light of the fact that 4 people were arrested by the NYPD, during the NYSAT project this last April. These individuals were trying to highlight the fact that NPA was operating illegally in our city and that our current law should allow the city to do something about it. Instead of being listened to these individuals spent the weekend in jail.

When laws are so blatantly disregarded by all parties involved, maybe they were never laws at all.