“The city of Mesa, Arizona, has threatened suit against a local businessman, Jeremy Whittaker, who is running for city council in opposition to a longtime city employee who enjoys endorsements from several current elected city officials. His offense? His lawn signs and campaign literature include a single-color version of the city’s logo …as a handy way of identifying the office for which he is running.” It has demanded he surrender all his campaign materials bearing the logo, but he’s not planning to give in. [Paul Alan Levy, CL&P via Mike Masnick, TechDirt]
One Comment
I once contacted Paul Alan Levy in regards to a similar issue where the city in which I live passed a law banning the use of the city logo in anything not approved by the city itself. Thus, the logo being used on sites discussing the sordid political politics were now deemed “illegal.” (Even reproducing city communications with the logo on a blog was banned.)
Mr. Levy said he would help and arranged for local pro bono counsel.
However, because we were scared of losing and the resultant fine and jail time from the law, we backed away. We shouldn’t have, but we did.
We have always been grateful that there are lawyers like Levy who are willing to take on issues like this even though we chickened out.
Maybe someday we’ll get the courage to go forward.
Our lack of fortitude does not diminish the work Levy does. In my book, he’s a legal rockstar.