EL MONTE from www.sgvtribune.com - Residents and local high school district officials are upset over a pair of porn-industry convention billboard advertisements, including one that was put up a few hundred feet from Arroyo High School.
About three weeks ago, workers put up two advertisements for the Adultcon, the Adult Education Convention, scheduled Sept. 10-12 at the Los Angeles Convention Center.
One billboard is on private property north of Lower Azusa Road near Arroyo High, which starts school Monday. Another Adultcon billboard was put up north of Valley Boulevard near Ramona Boulevard on a vacant 3-acre parcel owned by the El Monte Union High School District.
After complaints from residents and school officials, CBS Outdoor Advertising on Wednesday changed out the advertisement on the billboard near the school. The billboard on Valley was still up Friday.
The district wants it changed, too, said Tony Ortega, El Monte Union's assistant superintendent of business.
"It's our property, and we don't want to be identified with that event," Ortega said.
Although officials from the Los Angeles CBS office were forbidden by corporate rules from commenting on the matter, they said the advertisement on Valley would be taken down by Monday morning at the latest. Adultcon officials declined to comment.
El Monte Union leases billboards on other properties, but the district has a say on what kind of advertisements are placed on them, Ortega said.
"We have agreements in place that give us first right of refusal for any ad they want to put up," Ortega said. "We are hoping CBS will extend us that same courtesy."
While some cities have rules that require adult book stores or strip clubs to be a certain distance from schools, there's no such ordinance when it comes to billboards, said Roger Jon Diamond, a Los Angeles attorney who has represented several area strip clubs in fights against cities.
"They can use their discretion and take them down, but they have a right to put up those ads," he said.
Resident Pat Chavez said she complained to the district about the Adultcon ads. She said she realized CBS has a constitutional right to put them up. She wondered if CBS would try to place the advertisements in affluent communities.
"They're placing these in low-income, minority communities right across from a school," she said. "Why don't they put it in Arcadia by the Taboo (strip club)?"
Chavez said the city's leaders are working hard to make improvements to the 123,000-resident community, which has a median household income of $48,000, among the lowest figures in the county.
"El Monte is pushing to build the Transit Village and a lot of good things are happening," said Chavez, a retired adult-school teacher who has lived in El Monte for 34 years.
"What would outsiders think if they saw these?" she asked. "They're blight, really."
