Battle Brewing Over Trancas Market Signage

Some neighbors of the Trancas Country Market have been hoping for years that a rooftop sign advertising How's Market (and partially blocking ocean views) would be taken down. 

Rooftop commercial signs are illegal under the Malibu Municipal Code, but some legal wrangling may allow the sign to stay. 

With renovations at the center underway, the Malibu Planning Commission will consider a sign permit application for the Trancas Country Market at its June 3 meeting at Malibu City Hall. 

Instead of calling for the sign's removal, city staff have recommended commissioners allow the sign to remain and be resurfaced to advertise only the name of the shopping center. 

According to an Aug. 14 letter sent by the owner, “it is essential to the viability and visibility of the entire center for the property owners to be able to maintain the sign.” The letter argues that the shopping center was known as the Trancas Market for 50 years and that its removal would be "unconstitutional both as a taking and as an infringement of First Amendment rights."

A city staff report dated May 23 states that the sign can remain. 

"After further review, it was determined that the sign could remain based on the fact that the shopping center had in the past been known as the Trancas Market and since the roof sign included the words Trancas Market and there has been some type of business open at all times during construction within the center, as such, the roof sign is permitted to remain," according to the report.

Hans Laetz, who lives nearby, wrote a letter to the city opposing the sign and the city's defense of it. 

"Those contentions from the developer are factually and legally flawed," Laetz wrote in a letter dated May 17. The letter and its arguments were not included in the city's staff report. 

Laetz argued that the shopping center was not known as the "Trancas Country Market" until 2009 as a marketing tool. (The same leasing agent was overseeing the Brentwood Country Market at the time.)

As part of a long term solution, the city's Planning Department is seeking a Zoning Text Amendment, which would change the sign ordinance to require nonconforming signs to be removed by a certain time. 

"Staff believes this approach, amortizing the sign overan established period of time, is the best approach to getting the sign removed," the report states.

Malibu Patch will have more on the sign ordinance and other proposed changes at the Trancas Country Market soon.