Hepburn Shire Council, in partnership with Vic Roads, has installed a series of wooden frames at the entrance to our major towns and villages. These frames are referred to as Gateway Signs. Their purpose is to provide a facility for the community to advertise upcoming community events.
In order to be fair to all community groups, Council has placed its own restrictions around the use of the frames.
* Community signs must be professionally sign written and must be produced in the form of a hard sign or in banner format.
* Signs must measure 2m horizontally X 1.1m vertically. Both sides of a frame are available for use.
* Any corporate sponsorship or logo etc. must not exceed 10% of the total sign (210mm2).
* Gateway sign frames may only be reserved and signs displayed one month prior to an event.
* Signs must be taken down the day after the event.
* Signs must not contain any offensive material. If material is deemed offensive, signs will be removed, and the cost of removal will be charged to the organising committee.
* Signs must not be nailed or screwed onto the frame; they should be tied. The use of plastic cable ties or similar is preferred. Repair costs will be charged to the organising committee.
* Only the authorised Council frames are approved for use for temporary signs. No other locations can lawfully be used for this purpose. NOTE: It is illegal to erect star pickets to display your signs and anyone who does this may be held liable in the event of injury resulting from unauthorised erection of signs.
Any sign not conforming to these conditions, or not removed by the above stated time, may be impounded without further notice, and the cost of removal will be charged to the organising committee.
Should the gateway frames be empty and unallocated, an application for use by a business can be made, if it is advertising/promoting an event, issue or message considered to be of benefit to the community. A community event, auspiced by a bona fide community organisation, always has precedence. The frames may not be used by businesses to advertise their business, products or services.
Signs or events sponsored by business may include the business name as long as the name or logo occupies less than 10% of the sign.
NOTE: Bookings commence on a Monday and only blocks of 14 days are allocated.
At times there is a very high demand for the frames. Frames are often booked up to a year in advance. The frames are booked on a first-come-first-served basis. If all frames have been booked you may request to share a frame with a group who has it booked, but they are not obliged to share the frame unless they wish to do so.
Applications are not valid until approved by the Events Coordinator.
Note: Community benefit will largely be defined by an event’s capacity to enhance overall community strengthening, wellbeing, resilience, unity and mutual support. Among other things, this would be measured in terms of the number of different local groups involved and the level of participation by locals in, and attending, the event.