What do you expect from a firefighter if not common sense and courage?

That's what Portland firefighter-turned-City Commissioner Randy Leonard is showing as he has suspended enforcement of the city's sign code against artistic murals.

As ably reported last night by Bix and this morning by The O, Leonard yesterday ordered the City Hall bureaucrats under his command to stop harassing two Southeast Portland businesses who have put noncommercial murals on the walls near their businesses. Leonard is calling for a rewrite of the city code to once again distinguish between commercial and noncommercial wall coverings.

This is beautiful. When was the last time a City Commissioner ordered out-of-control city agency minions to stop doing something dumb?

Better yet was Leonard's response to Mayor Katz, who swears she knows it all on this issue. Said Randy: "It's an absurd ordinance, obviously.... This is not going to be fun for Vera to hear, but I think we have the votes to make changes."

Awesome! I told you to vote for this guy. You wouldn't have seen his opponent, Serena Cruz, taking action like this, that's for sure. She and Vera would be giving each other foot rubs by now.

Anyway, Leonard's got his work cut out for him. As pointed out in this blog not so long ago, the billboard company weasels believe they have established that under Oregon law, the city can't distinguish between commercial and noncommercial murals. And you can bet they and their lawyers will be suing the city's pants off if Leonard indeed has the votes to reinstitute that distinction on the city's ordinance books.

This is where we come in, friends -- we, the citizens of the Rose City.

When the billboard companies start acting up, I say we organize a good, old fashioned boycott. We identify one or more billboard companies who are taking the lead in attacking the art murals. And we boycott the goods and services that are being advertised on that company's boards.

Imagine an Oregon business getting calls from Portlanders to the following effect: "We see that you are advertising on X Company's billboards. X Company is challenging Portland's right to allow artistic murals where commercial billboards are prohibited. We believe what X Company is doing is wrong. And so we're not patronizing your business."

He he!

Don't underestimate the power of this. Although the billboard company denies it, a neighborhood campaign of this sort contributed to the undoing of the awful animated billboard that once "graced" the corner of NE 28th and Broadway. Every time a new ad went up, some neighbors from Hollywood and Sullivan's Gulch called the advertiser to express their concerns. Soon the sign went away, supposedly for "maintenance." That was a year and a half ago.

Anyway, however this turns out, three cheers for Randy Leonard.

"This is not going to be fun for Vera to hear, but I think we have the votes to make changes." As the kids say, bwaaahahahahahahaaahaa!