Campaign sign placement frustrates candidates

Campaign signs have blossomed at major intersections throughout the East Valley, and in most cases, they are placed in a way that allows them all to be seen clearly by passing traffic.

But sometimes, a candidate's sign intrudes on another. And when that happens, it can ruffle political feathers.

That was the case with one recent incident involving a congressional candidate and another campaign involving the Arizona Corporation Commission.

"This is not the way we do things in Arizona," said Julie Lind, campaign volunteer coordinator for Republican congressional candidate Laura Knaperek, who is running in District 5, which covers Tempe, Scottsdale, west Mesa, Fountain Hills and Ahwatukee Foothills.

For the second time in two years, Lind has been stymied by the signs of Sam George, who ran for the Central Arizona Water Conservation District board two years ago and is in this year's Democratic primary race for the ACC.

Cities don't regulate the placement of campaign signs in relation to each other, "and you wouldn't want them to," Lind said.

But she could be arrested if she takes matters into her own hands.

"I can't move the sign because I just know that when I do I'm going to get caught, there'll be cameras, police, reporters," she said, recalling the time she was working for Phoenix Mayor Phil Gordon's campaign and someone called the police after spying her as she squirted WD-40 on one of his signs.

So her only choice is to move her own campaign's banners.

"I'm the volunteer coordinator, so I'm the person who gets to tell all these nice young men, who are usually old retired men, to go move the signs. You can imagine how happy they are to hear that," she said.

Lind said she normally doesn't do anything about the sign placements, but when the Sam George signs went up earlier this week she couldn't let it go.

She had a hard time finding any kind of phone number for his current campaign, and once she did, her messages went unreturned.

And while she's seen George's signs blocking other candidates, it seemed to her Knaperek's signs were blocked more often than others.

George's campaign spokesman, Roberto Rodriguez, said the offending signs were installed by overenthusiastic campaign volunteers, and should all be moved by the end of the day Saturday.

"We have people who are very passionate about solar energy, and this is the first campaign they've worked for," he said.

It wasn't Knaperek's campaign who alerted them to the problem, he said, but state Rep. David Schapira, D-Tempe. Rodriguez pointed to this as evidence that the choices made by the George campaign volunteers weren't "venomous."

"Dave's a good friend of the campaign, so we wouldn't want to do anything to keep him from getting elected," Rodriguez said.

George is a consultant who served as Arizona's deputy secretary of state from 1998 to 2002 under the name Sam Vagenas, and is running on a platform of promoting solar energy.

Knaperek is a former state legislator running in the GOP primary for the seat held by Democratic Rep. Harry Mitchell.

Lind said clearing up the sign jams at street corners can be difficult.

"I don't know if anyone has resolved these sign issues, but when you don't you have Scottsdale's complete kibosh, practically, or it's the clutter going on down here (in Tempe)," she said.