PORT TOWNSEND — Jefferson County Public Utility District commissioners decided not to move forward with a request to add Blue Star Banners to utility poles.
While the commissioners and staff supported the program of supporting active duty military members, they want to avoid setting a precedent for possible future community additions to the poles.
“I am very supportive of citizens who are serving our county,” said District 1 commissioner Jeff Randall.
“The issue I have is our poles were not meant to be sign platforms, and when you start allowing things on there like the Lewis County PUD showed, you can’t really limit it to one purpose.”
The Blue Star Banner program installs street banners representing individual community members who are serving in the armed forces and stay up until they leave the service, when it is then presented to that veteran.
The PUD staff reached out to other Washington PUDs to learn about their policies regarding adding banners to utility poles, and out of the 10 responses —including Clallam PUD — only Lewis County PUD allows additions to utility poles, with strict requirements as to what is permitted and requiring an application, according to Jefferson PUD documents.
While no official vote was taken, all three commissioners and General Manager Kevin Streett said they did not support moving forward with the request during the board of commissioners meeting on Oct. 20.
“I really wanted to do the Blue Banner,” Streett said. “I wanted to offer that to our community. That said, we did reach out to the [Washington PUD Association] group, and only one other PUD in the state allows banners to be on a pole, and there has to be a reason.
“At least today, we should not do it. I think there’s just a little too much long-term issues with this program.
“As much as I would like to, and I think it is a good program, I just can’t recommend it to the commissioners to move forward,” Streett said.”
The commissioners discussion and documents can be found at tinyurl.com/PDN-PUDBlueBanner.
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Jefferson County reporter Zach Jablonski can be reached at 360-385-2335, ext. 5 or at zjablonski@peninsuladailynews.com.
