Lakewood, WA Sign Regulations: Digital Billboards (2026)

080(D). That nonconforming-sign chapter caps the citywide inventory: the total number of billboard faces cannot exceed the number that existed on the date Lakewood incorporated, February 28, 1996, and demolishing a billboard face permanently lowers that cap rather than freeing up capacity for a new one. If the City later annexes territory that already contains billboards, the allowable citywide total rises by the number of faces annexed. Existing nonconforming billboards can be maintained but not upgraded: ordinary maintenance and repair that does not change a billboard's size, shape, orientation, height, or location is allowed, and copy replacement, meaning changing the advertised message on the face, can happen at any time without a permit.

What an owner cannot do is add technology the code did not already allow. 080(D)(6)(c) specifically bars altering or modifying a billboard to add flashing, intermittent, or moving lights, meaning a legacy static billboard cannot be converted to a digital LED display; the only permitted modification in that category is to remove or reduce existing flashing lighting. Any lighting a billboard keeps must be shielded so the beam hits only the billboard face and does not glare into the travel lanes of an adjacent highway or airway.

050(D) does let monument, wall, and pole signs elsewhere in the city use digital displays with dimmable luminance controls, but that allowance is expressly limited to sign types otherwise permitted by the chapter, and billboards are not among them.