Granite State Outdoor v. City of Clearwater, Fla.

• Decision Date: 28 November 2003
• Docket Number: No. 02-14434. Argument Calendar.,02-14434. Argument Calendar.
• Parties: GRANITE STATE OUTDOOR ADVERTISING, INC., Plaintiff-Appellant, v. CITY OF CLEARWATER, FLORIDA, Brian Aungst, Sr., as an individual and in his capacity as Mayor of the city, William Horne, as an individual and in his capacity as city manager, Defendants-Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eleventh Circuit

Page 1112

351 F.3d 1112

GRANITE STATE OUTDOOR ADVERTISING, INC., Plaintiff-Appellant, v. CITY OF CLEARWATER, FLORIDA, Brian Aungst, Sr., as an individual and in his capacity as Mayor of the city, William Horne, as an individual and in his capacity as city manager, Defendants-Appellees.

No. 02-14434. Argument Calendar.

United States Court of Appeals, Eleventh Circuit.

November 28, 2003.

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

Edward Adam Webb, Dow, Lohnes & Albertson, Atlanta, GA, for Plaintiff-Appellant.

William D. Brinton, Rogers Towers, P.A., FL, Christine M. Russell, Rogers, Towers, Bailey, Jones & Gay, Jacksonville, FL, for Defendants-Appellees.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Middle District of Florida.

Before ANDERSON and BIRCH, Circuit Judges, and PROPST^*, District Judge.

BIRCH, Circuit Judge:

In this appeal, we must determine whether the district court properly denied plaintiff-appellant's, Granite State Outdoor Advertising, Inc. ("Granite State"), request for injunctive relief against defendant-appellee, the City of Clearwater, Florida ("the City" or "Clearwater"), after several permit applications to construct billboards in the City were denied under Article 3, Division 18 of the City's Community Development Code ("the Code"). The district court ruled that Granite State had standing to challenge the entirety of Article 3, Division 18, but not any part of Article 4, the part of the Code that governs the permit denial appeals process. The district court denied injunctive relief based on its ruling that, after unconstitutional provisions of Division 18 were severed from the remainder of the ordinance, the remaining provisions were constitutional. Upon consideration, we AFFIRM in part, REVERSE in part, and REMAND.

I. BACKGROUND¹

Granite State is a Georgia corporation in the business of buying or leasing land upon which to construct signs and billboards to be used for both commercial and non-commercial purposes. Granite State has never erected or operated a billboard, nor has it held a permit in its own name to erect a billboard. Granite State receives its profits from the sale of billboard permits it obtains from various cities and municipalities, some of which have been obtained through litigation similar to the case before us.

Clearwater is a political subdivision of the state of Florida and describes itself as a "resort community on the west coast of the state with more than five miles of beaches on the Gulf of Mexico" and with a tourism-based economy. Clearwater Cmty.Dev.Code § 3-1801 (1999). Clearwater, like many other cities, has codified various sign regulations to create a comprehensive scheme for regulating, inter alia, the permitting, placement, number, size, height, design, operation, and maintenance of signs within the City's boundaries. Id. §§ 3-1801-1807 (2003). The many purposes of these sign regulations include traffic safety and aesthetics of the community. Id. § 3-1802 (1999).

Granite State entered into lease agreements for a total of eight parcels of real property located in commercial or industrial areas of Clearwater. Granite State's goal was to construct and operate one freestanding billboard sign on each parcel of property. The City denied each of Granite State's permit applications because Granite State applied to construct billboards more than four times the allowable height and ten times the allowable area under Clearwater regulations. Rather than appeal the denial of its permits, Granite State initiated the current litigation in the Middle District of Florida challenging the constitutionality of Article 3, Division 18 and Article 4 of Clearwater's Community Development Code on First Amendment grounds and requesting injunctive relief.²

Article 3, Division 18 regulates both commercial and non-commercial signs and dictates when permits are required before certain signs may be erected. In particular, § 3-1806 regulates "[p]ermitted signs requiring development review." Part B.1. of this section deals with non-residential, freestanding signs, and it was under this part of § 3-1806 that Granite State's permits were denied. Specifically, subparts (c) and (e) of § 3-1806.B.1. dictate the allowable area and height, respectively, of a freestanding sign. Article 4 sets forth the process for obtaining various levels of permit approval and also details the appeals process to contest denial of a permit.

The district court granted Granite State standing to challenge the entirety of Article 3, Division 18 on First Amendment grounds, both as applied and under the overbreadth doctrine, and denied it standing to challenge any part of Article 4 on either ground. Because we find the district court misapplied the overbreadth doctrine, we reverse the district court's grant of standing to Granite State to challenge provisions of the City's sign ordinance that did not give rise to an injury in fact (i.e., provisions other than § 3-1806.B.1.), and we remand this case for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. We affirm the district court's denials of (1) standing to challenge any part of Article 4, (2) injunctive relief, and (3) attorney's fees.

II. DISCUSSION

A. Standing

Article III, § 2 of the United States Constitution requires that there be a "case" or "controversy" before a federal court may decide a case. U.S. CONST. art. III, § 2. See, e.g., Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 559-60, 112 S.Ct. 2130, 2136, 119 L.Ed.2d 351 (1992). The constitutional requirements for a federal court to adjudicate a case are accompanied by prudential requirements. See, e.g., Bennett v. Spear, 520 U.S. 154, 162, 117 S.Ct. 1154, 1161, 137 L.Ed.2d 281 (1997); Lujan, 504 U.S. at 560, 112 S.Ct. at 2136. Together, these constitutional and prudential requirements form the doctrine of standing. See, e.g., Bennett, 520 U.S. at 162, 117 S.Ct. at 1161; Lujan, 504 U.S. at 560, 112 S.Ct. at 2136.

The Supreme Court has identified three constitutional requirements for standing, all of which must be satisfied: (1) an injury in fact, meaning an injury that is concrete and particularized, and actual or imminent, (2) a causal connection between the injury and the causal conduct, and (3) a likelihood that the injury will be redressed by a favorable decision.³ See, e.g., Bennett, 520 US. at 167, 117 S.Ct. at 1163. The Court also has identified three prudential standing principles. See, e.g., Allen v. Wright, 468 U.S. 737, 751, 104 S.Ct. 3315, 3324, 82 L.Ed.2d 556 (1984). Relevant here is the principle that a party generally may assert only his or her own rights and cannot raise the claims of third parties not before the court. See, e.g., id.

Certain exceptions to the prudential standing requirements have developed in Supreme Court jurisprudence. Significant to this case is the "overbreadth doctrine," an exception that applies in First Amendment cases involving noncommercial speech and that permits third-party standing when a statute is constitutionally applied to the litigant but might be unconstitutionally applied to third parties not before the court. See, e.g., Village of Schaumburg v. Citizens for a Better Env't, 444 U.S. 620, 634, 100 S.Ct. 826, 834-35, 63 L.Ed.2d 73 (1980). The overbreadth doctrine, however, is not an exception to the constitutional standing requirements. Bischoff v. Osceola County, Fla., 222 F.3d 874, 884 (11th Cir.2000). A plaintiff seeking to make an overbreadth challenge must first show that he has suffered an injury in fact, as required under Article III. See, e.g., Virginia v. Am. Booksellers Ass'n Inc., 484 U.S. 383, 392-93, 108 S.Ct. 636, 642-43, 98 L.Ed.2d 782 (1988); Village of Schaumburg, 444 U.S. at 634, 100 S.Ct. at 834; Bischoff, 222 F.3d at 884.

An "injury in fact" requires the plaintiff to "show that he personally has suffered some actual or threatened injury." Valley Forge Christian College v. Americans United for Separation of Church and State, 454 U.S. 464, 472, 102 S.Ct. 752, 758, 70 L.Ed.2d 700 (1982) (emphasis added) (internal quotations omitted). While this requirement is hard to define precisely, we know that the plaintiff must at least claim to personally suffer some harm. See, e.g., Lujan, 504 U.S. at 562-63, 112 S.Ct. at 2137-38; United States v. Students Challenging Regulatory Agency Procedures (SCRAP), 412 U.S. 669, 686-87, 93 S.Ct. 2405, 2415, 37 L.Ed.2d 254 (1973).

1. Division 18, § 3-1806.B.1. of the Clearwater Community Development Code

In this case, the only harm that Granite State has personally suffered is under § 3-1806.B.1. of the Clearwater Community Development Code. It was under this provision that Granite State's billboard permits were denied. Granite State has suffered no injury regarding any other provision in Article 3, Division 18. Thus, Granite State has standing to challenge the constitutionality of only § 3-1806.B.1. as applied to it and, under the overbreadth doctrine, as applied to non-commercial speech.

This provision was constitutionally applied to Granite State: it sought to construct a billboard sign much larger than any sign allowed under the Clearwater regulations. Moreover, because § 3-1806.B.1. is content-neutral and gives no discretion to the permitting authority, this provision is not overbroad.⁴ See, e.g., Staub v. Baxley, 355 U.S. 313, 322, 78 S.Ct. 277, 282, 2 L.Ed.2d 302 (1958); Horton v. City of St. Augustine, 272 F.3d 1318, 1331-32 (11th Cir.2001). Thus, Granite State's constitutional challenge to § 3-1806.B.1. must fail. This issue is remanded to the district court for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.

2. Article 4 of the Clearwater Community Development Code

Granite State does not have standing to challenge Article 4 of the Code because it has suffered no injury with regard to the City's permitting and appeals process.⁵ Granite State argues that it did not avail itself of the allegedly unconstitutional appeals process because the ordinance does not contain sufficient...