ODOT Fans, owners of barns oppose order to buy permit or cover signs

The 110 members of an Ohio club drive hundreds of miles to see the ads.
ATHENS, Ohio (AP) -- Owners of barns overlooking federal highways that advertise tobacco and other products are being given a choice: Buy a permit or paint over the sign.
The decision by the Ohio Department of Transportation has outraged some barn owners and fans of the signs, who say the signs are a form of art that has historical value.
Those who travel the country hunting for barn ads, such as Lancaster resident Eddie Robberts, worry the owners won't pay for the permits and more signs will disappear.
"I don't chew tobacco. It's gross," said Robberts, who photographs Mail Pouch barn signs. "It's about Americana, about nostalgia."
Who fans are
People drive hundreds of miles just to take a picture of the old tobacco ads painted in 4-foot block letters on Victoria Goss' wooden barn south of this town about 70 miles southeast of Columbus. The ads appeared in National Geographic Magazine last year.
Notifications sent to barn owners last week were part of a statewide review ODOT started about two months ago.
Every two years, four ODOT employees drive around the state looking for advertisements on all roads it controls. About 11,000 permits are issued each time. Most cost $225 upfront and $125 every other year, generating nearly $1.4 million for ODOT every two years, spokesman Brian Cunningham said.
The federal Highway Beautification Act requires states to regulate advertisements within 660 feet of a federal highway, said Kerry Yoakum, administrator of ODOT's Office of Contracts. What the ads are selling doesn't matter.
"They could have said anything. They could have said 'Eat at Joe's,'" Cunningham said.
One side of the Goss barn facing U.S. 33 reads, "Chew Mail Pouch. Treat Yourself to the Best," but the message is obscured by trees and a pile of wood chips. Drivers traveling north can see the words "Smoke Kentucky Club" on the barn's south side.
"Can you buy Kentucky Club tobacco?" Yoakum asked. "I bet you can. You can buy Mail Pouch tobacco."
What it would cost
The Mail Pouch signs that once adorned many roadside barns are a rare sight these days. But dozens of Web sites are dedicated to finding them, and a 110-member club based in Ohio meets to share photos.
Goss said she sees this as nothing more than a revenue source for the state. Permits for the two signs on her barn would cost $450 initially and $250 every two years after that.
"I don't know how to word where my rage is, but it's sort of unfair taxation," she said. "They're holding this barn hostage."
She moved the barn in 1998 to save it from demolition by ODOT. The barn was going to be torn down to make way for a widening project on U.S. 50.
Now, it houses injured horses in an animal-rescue operation called Last Chance Corral.
Aaron and Samuel Bloch started the Mail Pouch chewing tobacco brand in 1879. Now, it's manufactured by Swisher International in Jacksonville, Fla. For years, Swisher hired workers to maintain the barn signs. The last painter, Ohioan Harley Warrick, died in 2000.