Rest area vending machines getting another look

Some state lawmakers want to address the clutter of publication vending machines at Iowa's interstate rest areas - a well-traveled legislative road that usually ends at the courthouse.

The latest effort in a long-running dispute over the placement and display of various publications geared to truck drivers, singles looking to meet other singles and other topics at 40 state-owned rest areas along interstate highways traversing Iowa is House File 154, a bill filed by Rep. Mark Brandenburg, R-Council Bluffs, at the request of a constituent who was upset over the rows on vending machines and the subject matter that travelers encounter during a routine highway pit stop.

“When you look at it, it's not very pleasing to the eye,” said Brandenburg, who took photos at a rest stop to convey the concern to follow legislators. “Aesthetically speaking, there could be some improvements I think.”

It has been free-speech protections that have thwarted past state efforts to regulate the activity on publicly owned property, said Elizabeth Baird, a lobbyist for the state Department of Transportation, and there are active lawsuits under way in other states that likely will bring the issue before the U.S. Supreme Court at some point.

Brandenburg sought to establish and implement a policy that would govern the location, size, shape and appearance of publication racks supplied by a vendor. He also wanted to establish a fee not to exceed $500 per publication rack at a single rest stop.

However, a House subcommittee decided to drop the fee - which is the subject of current litigation - and scale back the legislation's focus to give DOT officials authority to establish administrative rules for rest area publications, something Baird said the agency currently does not have.

“There are probably some things we can do and, if we do it within certain confines with certain language, it could be positive and could address some of those concerns,” Baird said. “It's folks that have the free publications that some people don't like, they don't want to see them, they don't want their kids to see them and they want to say, no, you can't do that. So you have to find some way to balance all of that.”

At a minimum, Brandenburg said he would like to see publications displaying images that some parents may not consider appropriate for their children to view would be placed behind an opaque glass cover or inside a sleeve like adult material is handled in many convenient stores or service stations where they are offered for sale.

The issue dates back to at least the 1990s when the publisher of a Midwest singles-meeting-singles monthly successfully challenged DOT rest-area restrictions that he charged were infringements on his access rights at a public facility.