At a noontime announcement at the Lower Merion Township Administration Building, Sen. Pat Toomey (R, Pa.) said he would introduce legislation to eliminate the federal government's power to regulate street sign reflectivity.

If passed, Toomey said the legislation—called the Stopping Intrusive Government Now (SIGN) act—would save the township's historic cast-iron street signs and protect municipal governments from "cumbersome regulation" while preventing the federal government from "overstepping its bounds."

"It will allow communities to make their own decisions on their own timetable," the senator said, calling street sign mandates a "classic case of a decision that should be made at the local level."

Toomey added that he expects broad congressional support for the legislation.

The SIGN act comes after a fierce fight surrounding the fate of Lower Merion's historic cast-iron street signs. Facing a 2018 deadline from the U.S. Department of Transportation to replace all of its street signs with bigger, more reflective alternatives (at an estimated cost to the township of $1.5 million), the township received an exemption from the regulation in April from Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood.

Then in August, under pressure from Toomey, the U.S. DOT dropped its deadline alltogether—revising its replacement policy from a hard-and-fast deadline to one that mandates the change only when replacement of a sign is otherwise necessary.

But the language of the waiver, considered by opponents as ambiguous, as well as the continued existence of a sign-replacement mandate, kept alive the possibility that Lower Merion would eventually have to replace its signs. Toomey's legislation would foreclose that possibility.

Board of Commissioners president Liz Rogan, who introduced the senator, cautioned that while she views the legislation as a "big step in the right direction," the township would still have some decisions to make between now and the ultimate resolution of the legislation.

"We will have to decide which signs we use to replace a sign that has gone down," she told Patch after the press conference. That is, replace it with a cast iron one or the new one? 

That issue aside, the mood at the press conference was a bright one.

Commissioner Scott Zelov said the legislation would eliminate onerous regulation, remove the federal government from a fundamentally local manner, and allow Lower Merion to preserve an essential aspect of its identity.

"We're very pleased," Zelov said.

Rogan, as leader of an overwhelmingly Democratic board (Dems outnumber Republicans 7-2), acknowledged it was peculiar to court support from a prominent national Republican, but said she was happy to have it.

"We will work with all comers," she laughed.

After introducing the SIGN legislation, the senator also took occasion to announce the creation of a related constituent services program called "Had Enough?"

The initiative invites Pennsylvanians to write Toomey with instances of local overregulation—such as the street sign mandate—that they've witnessed.

Toomey called the program a "simple and direct" way for constituents to help peel back red tape.

"Whether it costs jobs for a small employer, taxpayers in a municipality, or just an individual, we want to hear about it," he said.

Toomey promised he would read the complaints and respond by appealing to the pertinent regulators or proposing legislation that addresses them.

Residents can submit an idea through the senator's website.