Public notice signs face drivers, not pedestrians
If you are not paying close attention you could miss required public notice signs.
The expectation must be that motorists driving by at 35mph are going to read the notices. But even up close it is not easy.
With the curve of the sign on the poles I couldn’t see all the information at one point. I didn’t spot these until after the fact.
We need a public notice system for the 21st century. Where you register your address and then set your preferences to how far away you want to be notified: 100 feet, 1/4 mile , 3 miles, etc. You’d be notified via email for anything within the set radius from your address. Perhaps it would be tied to your voter registration? Such a system should be regional and cross the many jurisdictional boundaries.
In the above example the pedestrians on the sidewalk probably have more interest than the motorists driving by. At least post the signs where both can see they exist.
– Steve Patterson
It's hard to tell, but did they post the same notice three times, in essentially the same place? If so, I think you have grounds to claim improper posting and to require another hearing, following proper posting.
Bigger picture, I think both answers are correct. Public postings, done correctly, do reach the greatest number of directly-affected people. Individual notification is also good, but ONLY if you can be sure that EVERYONE who would want to be notified is notified. If, as happened in this case, someone is missed, for whatever reason, then the whole process can be called into question.
What might actually work better would be a virtual billboard, where all required public notices could be posted, in duplicate, on a website. Yes, it would require action on the part of interested citizens, but it could help you, and others, avoid what happened here.
And, for better or worse, our small wards can be a similar resource. Ald. Joe Vacarro seems to be doing a good job of notifying his interested constituents of issues like this one in the 23rd ward.
The signs were for three different licenses/hearings.
Coming from a different state, I was surprised that public notices here were taped to posts. I had never encountered that before. In many communities, all notices are published in a selected local newspaper. That way everyone in the community has equal access and notice-time to everything going on. Downfall is the digital age. And, I can already hear the complaints that people would have to go look up what's going on instead of it being handed to them.
everyblock.com basically does what you are describing. You put in your address/zip/neighborhood and you get an automated webpage full of local news. You can make a custom RSS feed and put it in your favorite news reader. I use it in San Francisco and get notices for all the 911 calls, real estate listings, street use permits, new Yelp reviews, pictures tagged to the area, and several other things within a certain radius. I think they started in Chicago. Unfortunately, they don't have one for St. Louis yet.