With the furore in Matamata about the height of the lettering on election signs, Raglan 23 thought it would be wise to check up on whether our candidates are following the rules. In residential areas of the Waikato District, all lettering on signs must be taller than 124mm and the number of letters must be 40 or less. Signs are not allowed on road reserves. All candidates are given a booklet which explains clearly the requirements for election signs. The reason for these requirements is traffic safety so that they can be read safely from a moving vehicle. It also makes sense that if you are spending money on a sign, it needs to be able to be read. We found that both the signs promoting Mr Vink’s ‘Fresh Perspective’ and Mr Baddeley’s ‘Re-elect’ themes had signage issues.
We developed a signage gauge using the recycled back cover of the Waikato District Council’s Annual Plan. We calibrated the gauge to exactly 124mm and applied it to the signs and then photographed the signs showing the gauge next to the lettering. This check of the signs for the Raglan Councillor candidates showed that neither the signs of Mr Baddeley or Mr Vink comply with the Council’s rules for the signs. For Mr Vink, all of the lettering on his sign is under the specified minimum including his slogan ‘A fresh perspective’. His signs also have more than 40 letters on them and some of his signs are installed on road reserves. While Mr Baddeley has some letters over the minimum, most of the letters on his sign are under the stated minimum. Most of his signs are not on road reserves.
Mayoral candidate Noel Smith has signs around Raglan with all letters under the 124mm minimum. We haven’t noticed any signs up yet around Raglan from any of the other mayoral contenders. Waikato District Health Board candidate Phyllis Huitema has a sign up with what is probably the smallest lettering of any of ones currently seen around Raglan.
Raglan local, Dave Currie, a candidate for the Waikato Regional Council managed to get two letters the right size- the C and i of Currie and the remaining letters of Currie were just under the magic 124mm requirement. Mr Currie’s sign also fails though as it is installed on a fence above a road reserve- another no-no under the rules.
At recent meetings of the Raglan Community Board, the design of signs around town has been discussed and the view of the Board Members is that signs around Raglan should look arty and funky. None of the current crop of election signs would qualify on those grounds, but they have all been well designed and look good. I do hope that the Waikato District Council applies its normal quirky approach to these signs and allows them to remain. It would be silly if they required the candidates to apply for retrospective resource consent for the signs or required them all to be redone. It would be good if commonsense prevails.
While having the right height of lettering on signs may seem trivial, it is an indicator of how well each candidate can read and understand the myriad of complex reports that Council staff prepare for them to study, consider and vote on.