By ROBIN SHANNON

Staff Reporter

LAPLACE – The primary election ended nearly a month ago, but campaign signs from candidates no longer involved in political races remain scattered throughout St. John the Baptist Parish.

A parish ordinance, on the books since last year, states that all political signs are to be taken down no later than 10 days following the election. Today is the 29th day since the October 20 primary, and signs from parish presidential candidates Arnold J. Labat and Perry Bailey, along with signs from Matthew Ory, who ran an unsuccessful bid for state representative, remain up in various parts of the parish.

Parish attorney Jeff Perilloux said the parish has done what it can to dispose of signs still on thoroughfares, but the ultimate solution is just to get the candidates to take their signs down.

“It’s a nuisance and an eyesore for the parish,” said Perilloux. “It is the candidates’ mess and they should comply with the spirit of the ordinance and get rid of them.”

Perilloux said some of the signs remain on private property, and although the ordinance gives the parish the right to remove signs from private homes and businesses, the parish is not in a position to remove them.

“Most of the effect of the ordinance is for candidates to self enforce it,” said Perilloux. “We are appealing to the candidates to quickly get rid of the signs themselves. They should do the right thing.”

When asked about his signs remaining on display in the parish, Labat said most of them should have been down already, but admits he could have missed a few.

“We had so many scattered throughout the parish,” said Labat. “We made a concerted effort to get them all up in a timely manner.”

Attempts to reach Perry Bailey were unsuccessful as of press time. A sign from his parish president campaign remains standing along Highway 51 near Airline Highway.

Matthew Ory, who has a number of signs that remain scattered along Airline Highway, Highway 51, and West 5th Street, said he is doing everything he can to get all of his old signs disposed of.

“I put them all up on my own,” said Ory. “I am working very hard to get them down on my own.”

Ory admits he could have missed some of the signs remaining along the roads, because they were knocked down flat and hard to see.

“I work long hours during the day, and the only time I had been able to go out and remove signs was in the evening,” said Ory. “Signs laying flat are not as easy to see with little light.”

Ory said the ordinance does not clearly dictate exactly what needs to be done by candidates. He said the language does not clarify exactly what a political sign means.

“There are signs that say ‘elect’ and ‘re-elect,’ and then there are signs with just the candidate’s name,” said Ory. “What exactly does a ‘political sign’ mean?”

Ory also brought up the issue of various large billboards, which are paid advertisements that run a specific course. He said those should not be exempt either.

Perilloux maintains that certain aspects of the ordinance need to be tweaked before the next election to clarify exactly what the parish wants. He said there were issues during this election that showed the weakness of the language.

“The billboards are one of those issues,” said Perilloux. “They were not exempt from the language of the law, but we believed it was the kind of thing that could be argued either way.”

Perilloux made one final appeal to all the candidates to do what they can to make sure their signs are cleaned up.

“Candidates and their volunteers used so much energy putting the signs up, we just ask that they use the same level of energy to remove the signs.”