St. Petersburg, FL Sign Regulations: Digital Billboards (2026)

Section 16.40.120.8 of the St. Petersburg City Code makes a digital billboard a negotiated exception, not a by-right use. Subsection A allows these signs only in conjunction with an approved enforceable agreement that provides for a reduction in the number of off-premise signs in the City, authorized under F.S. § 70.20, the Bert J. Harris, Jr. Private Property Rights Protection Act. Under subsection B, once an existing conforming or nonconforming sign is demolished, removed and disposed of without a replacement authorized by such an agreement, that property loses off-premise signs as a permitted structure. Before any sign permit issues, subsection C requires a letter or other written documentation from the State of Florida showing the sign is not subject to State regulation, complies with it, or will comply as proposed.

Location is tight. Digital faces are allowed only within 100 feet of the interstate right-of-way, including the downtown feeders. They are prohibited on the same site as a National Register or locally designated historic structure or within a historic district, within 500 feet of such a structure unless an interstate or feeder separates the two, and within 500 feet of residentially zoned property, measured from the leading edge of the sign face to the closest residential property line. A digital sign must be at least 2,500 feet from any other digital off-premise sign facing the same direction on the same roadway, measured along the centerline of the abutting roadway, and a driver must not be able to read more than one digital face at once.

A face cannot exceed 14 feet and 1¾ inches in height and 48 feet and 2¼ inches in width, with the black border counted in the area. Height tops out at 25 feet or the height of the static billboard being replaced, whichever is greater, and the City verifies that existing height before the old sign is altered or removed.

Operating rules: a dwell time of at least ten seconds, instantaneous message changes, no special effects, a static message with no animation, flashing or scrolling, and no consecutive slots that answer a question or continue a sentence or story line. A light sensor must hold brightness to 0.3 foot candles above ambient light, measured 150 feet from faces of 300.0 square feet or less, 200 feet for faces up to 378.0 square feet, and 250 feet for larger faces. The sign must go dark or show full black on malfunction. No variances are available, and the POD will not accept a variance application.

The authorization is time-limited. Subsection F ends the digital allowance on the 20th anniversary of Ordinance No. 35-H, effective August 23, 2012, when the owner must convert each digital sign to a static sign or demolish it at its own expense.