Politically-Charged Posters Removed from Cafe Hey as RNC Begins

Posters featured in Cafe Hey's weeklong poster show coinciding with the RNC were torn down from the restaurant's exterior by Tampa Code Enforcement | Image courtesy of thepostershow.com

With the Republican National Convention in Tampa  this week, local business owner Cheong Choi decided to take advantage of the historical event and extensive media coverage to put on a politically-charged poster show for artists around the world to exhibit their political art. Not even two days after three of the posters were placed on the exterior wall of Choi’s business, Cafe Hey,  the posters were ripped down by Tampa Code Enforcement officials with little explanation.

Choi worked closely with Gracieli Scremin, an assistant communications professor from the University of Tampa, to plan an art event to be held during the week of the RNC. With Cafe Hey located on the perimeter just outside of the event zone, Choi and Scremin wanted to take advantage of the location to create a venue for people to express themselves while garnering attention as visitors and media flocked to the bay area for the week. The poster show included politically-charged work from artists all over the world ranging from Brazil to Germany and California to Tennessee.

Choi and Scremin took a sample of three of these posters and placed them on the outside wall facing the convention zone perimeter.

“I thought, let’s paste some posters there. It’s private property and Cheong was supportive of the idea,” said Scremin.

They pasted the posters on Friday Aug. 24, one poster depicting a smiling Mitt Romney with the words “I like firing people” superimposed over his face. On Sunday Aug. 26, the posters were partially ripped down by Tampa Code Enforcement officials asserting that they were not compliant with city ordinances.

“Basically the Code Enforcement guy essentially didn’t know the ordinances and that’s my impression,” said Choi. “We knew what ordinances allowed us to put it out there. Really the only thing that the Code Enforcement guy could say was to say the name of the chapter of all the sign ordinances and we said, well, under subheading this and number this, it does allow us to put these up here and he really didn’t want to talk to us after that.”

This was not the first time Choi had placed posters on the exterior walls of Cafe Hey, as the restaurant holds art shows on a regular basis.

"I Like Firing People," by Ryann Slauson of Tampa was the main poster torn down by Tampa Code Enforcement | Image courtesy of thepostershow.com

“We’ve had posters up outside. Nothing was ever–and neither were these posters that we did put outside, for a permanent basis. We were just planning to put them up for a few days throughout the duration of the RNC,” asserted Choi.

“Very fittingly, the Code Enforcement just rips off [the poster of Romney]. That was very interesting,” thought Scremin. ” I think the bottom line is that, the way they did it, in my view, was uncalled for. It was an abuse of power…. It was not necessary and a little aggressive on their part. If anything, if you find a violation, deal with it in a way that is respectful. They vaguely cited a code.”

Santiago Echeverry, an associate professor of art at the University of Tampa, helped in the design of  thepostershow.com, the official website for the poster show  which displays the art and artists’ names featured at the Cafe Hey weeklong event. Upset at the incident with Tampa code enforcement, Echeverry did some research on the code.

“I actually checked the code, the city code, and they have 14 days  to remove that. They have 14 days,” Echeverry affirmed.  “There’s an entire process but no, these guys went straight to tearing the Mitt Romney poster and removing the message that said ‘I like firing people,’ and they did it just on their own and they threatened them with a fine.”

Choi was ordered by the City of Tampa to remove what was left of the already torn posters or be subject to a fine of $300.

“When you’re a small business and they threaten you with a $300 fine, you can’t do that. They cannot afford to do that,” Echeverry continued.

As reported by the Huffington Post, the city got in touch with the property owner who agreed on the removal of the posters, forcing Choi to take what was left of the posters down. Though still questioning what ordinances the cafe violated, with little information from the city, Choi does not plan to take any further action.

“It doesn’t really interest us to take action for it. We never planned to leave it up permanently, unless we want to continue antagonizing the City of Tampa Code Enforcement which was not even remotely our original intent and not in our interest,” Choi affirmed.

“The thing is, if the City of Tampa art community wants to do something,  we’re willing to talk to them and help them because it does kind of infringe on their rights. Less on ours and more on theirs.”

Jessica Keesee can be reached at jessica.keesee@theminaretonline.com