Schools in Sammamish may have to make do with their manual lettering signs, at least for the time being, after the City of Sammamish Planning Commission voted last Thursday to recommend that the city not amend its sign code.

Students, teachers and parents at Eastlake High School have for a number of years been urging the city to ease codified restrictions on electronic reader board signs, in order to allow the school to better communicate information about events.

In a number of presentations to the Sammamish City Council, students and staff claimed that the changing the manual lettering sign posed a safety hazard, was laborious, and often brought students away from their studies.

Skyline High School joined the Eastlake push to allow electronic signs at schools.

Although sympathetic to schools’ request, the planning commission’s 5-2 vote against an amendment reflects a concern that such a change to the code could lead to “a sign epidemic.”

That was the term used by planning commission member Scott Hamilton to describe what could happen in Sammamish should all schools be allowed to erect electronic signs.

“On the 228th corridor alone, you have Pine Lake Middle School, Discovery Elementary, Skyline High School, Eastlake High School, Eastside Catholic, Sammamish Children’s School, the Arbor School,” Hamilton said. “If we allow it for them we would need to allow it for all the other schools in the neighborhood.”

At Thursday’s meeting, commission member Stan Bump proposed a motion that the commission endorse the “no action” option, of the three options presented to them.

The other two options allowed electronic signs on school property.

The motion was seconded by Hamilton, and supported by Richard Amidei, Jan Klier, and Erica Tiliacos.

Commission members Tom Vance and Mahbubul Islam voted against the “no action” motion.

Hamilton told The Reporter this week that another reason for the commission’s desire to leave the code as it was at the moment was to allow for the development of a sign code for the planned Town Center.

“We wouldn’t want to allow these schools (inside the town center boundaries) to erect a sign that would not be in compliance with the town center,” he said. “What ordinances we put together for the town center ought to be the template for the rest of the city. Erica Tiliacos and myself made a point of expressing our sympathy with the schools, but believe that these adjustments should not be made when the planning guidelines for the town center are pending.”

Hamilton believes that the signs in schools issue would soon resurface, and said that the commission urged the Sammamish City Council to put it on top of the city’s 2010 agenda.

The council will now vote on whether to accept the planning commissions’ recommendation, most likely at their meeting on July 21.