Signs from June election still linger in Southwest County

"If we don't keep a handle on it and the public sees we're not enforcing it, it gets out of control," he said.

That's why Hemet Mayor Robin Lowe, who ran unsuccessfully in the June 6 Republican primary for the 65th Assembly District seat, said this week that she specifically promised during the campaign to have her signs taken down immediately after the election.

"I say it every single election," she said. "I'm trying to get the message across to my comrades out there that they need to get them down. I think they're a public nuisance and I think the public finds them distasteful."

Lowe said she keeps close tabs during an election where signs are posted with maps so that they can be promptly taken down. If signs are given to people who want to post them in their yards, she said, they are asked to take them down and their names and addresses are recorded for followup.

Temecula and Murrieta code enforcement officials did not return phone calls seeking comment last week. The municipal codes in each of those cities provide for 14-day periods after an election during which political signs must come down.

Branstine said that his dictate after the election was to have the signs come down within one or two days. He also said he made efforts to keep track of signs as Lowe did.

But because there were so many and because it was hard to keep track of where volunteers were posting them, some were overlooked. And the 66th District encompasses a large area, he said, also making it hard to keep track of all the signs.

Another factor, Branstine said, was the fact that about 250 of his signs were stolen or taken down during the campaign. Keeping track of which got replaced and which didn't was difficult and resulted in an incomplete list of where signs were posted.

"That just adds to the difficulty," he said.



