Leasing water towers as billboards is a bad idea!

Recently, several news articles were discovered that described how a community in Oklahoma had sold the advertising rights on two of their water towers to private companies.  Apparently, the City of Yukon was surprised by the increased costs associated with repainting their towers. As a solution, they leased advertising space on their water towers to companies to help defray part of the cost of the work. The initial leases were in the amounts of:

• $25,000 from Yukon National Bank in 2005, plus unspecified costs for materials and labor; and
• $100,000 from Integris Health in 1999 to put its name on a water tower along Interstate 40. This agreement has been renewed as recently as 2019 (see below).

“The Yukon City Council approved a 10-year agreement with Integris Health so the Integris name and logo would be painted on the side of the 10th Street and Frisco Road water towers. Integris agreed to pay $75,000 for the 10th Street tower and $35,000 for the Frisco Road tower.”

Source: yukonprogressnews.com (from 2019)

It’s one thing to advertise your community on its own water tower or to support a local school/team or perhaps an historic business on it, but it’s an entirely different matter to treat public property like a billboard. Here’s why:

• It promotes one business entity over others.
• It allows off-site signage which in many places is a violation of local zoning codes.
• It starts a slippery slope of turning public property into a cash cow with advertising going to the highest bidder.
• It can become a conflict of interest for future decisions related to the company that is advertising on the water tower(s), as the community now has an indirect financial stake in the decision. Every decision from building permits to zoning changes may risk being tainted.

Yukon does appear to have some provisions in its code that allows taller signage under certain conditions when they are located closely proximite to Interstate 40. But, regardless of such code provisions, is taking the step to allow advertising on your water tower(s) a good idea?

Some might argue that communities already allow advertising in public spaces such as in stadiums. Well, for one, that’s a confined space versus a tall, openly visible location that is viewable from afar. Similarly, one might say there are already signs on buses or commuter trains. But, in those cases, it is a separate transit agency from the city/town itself and those agencies do not make land use decisions.

Advertising on public infrastructure such as water towers is akin to placing ads on fire hydrants, street lights, traffic signals, or street signs. Where does one draw the line and when does the advertising become an unsafe distraction to motorists and the like?

An old public sector adage says, “How would this action look in the court of public opinion as a headline?”  The only way for a public entity to avoid having to answer uncomfortable questions is to take the prudent step of avoiding even the appearance of a conflict of interest altogether. Allowing the equivalent of billboards on a water tower will only create unnecessary headaches that could be avoided altogether. Given the dearth of other examples from across the country, it would seem that most communities agree.

Peace!

SOURCES:

• https://www.oklahoman.com/story/news/2005/07/09/banks-ad-to-help-pay-for-painting-yukon-tower/61935396007/
• https://nondoc.com/2025/01/15/yukon-audit-finds-breakdown-in-governance-for-decades-under-prior-city-managers/
• https://yukonprogressnews.com/2019/12/31/yukon-a-look-back-at-2019/
• https://library.municode.com/ok/yukon/codes/code_of_ordinances?nodeId=PTIICOOR_CH213SI