Now that the primary election is over, who cleans up all those campaign signs?

Dozens of candidates vying for city offices, from mayor to register of wills, planted a thicket of campaign signs through Philadelphia over the last few months.

A week after the city’s primary election, signs, a lot of them, are all that’s left of most of those campaigns.

So whose job is it to clean up the mess? That’s what a reader wondered through Curious Philly, The Inquirer’s forum for questions about the city and region, after spotting years-old signs still visible this campaign season.

Private-property owners are responsible for disposing of any signs on their lawns or buildings. Campaigns are responsible for collecting their own signs from public spaces, the city said.

“We encourage the campaigns to take the signs down as soon as possible as to not create litter conditions,” said Keisha McCarty-Skelton, a spokesperson for the Philadelphia Streets Department.

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Campaigns aren’t always thorough or speedy about collecting their leftovers. The Curious Philly questioner noted seeing Chuck Peruto signs still up from his losing campaign for district attorney in 2021.

Sign litter is significant enough that a bill proposed in the Pennsylvania House this session would give campaigns a 10-day window to clean up after themselves. After that, they could incur a fine of $50 to $300 and a penalty of five to 30 hours of community service to be spent, appropriately enough, picking up campaign signs, along with other trash.

It’s tough to say how many signs campaigns printed for the primary election, but ballots last week included more than 60 candidates for office in Philadelphia.

Just the field program of the Super PAC Philadelphians for Our Future, which supported Cherelle Parker, posted 1,000 signs in public areas and an additional 4,000 signs on voters’ lawns, manager Jeff Sheridan said. The PAC’s team was in the process of collecting the signs in public spaces, he said.

No city department is specifically responsible for removing these signs, said McCarty-Skelton, but the Streets Department will collect signs while doing other work, such as cleaning up illegal dumping or doing road work. PennDot will remove signs within their rights-of-way, about 360 miles of Philadelphia’s 2,575 road miles.

McCarty-Skelton noted it isn’t legal to put signs on city utility poles, streetlights, traffic signs or parking devices, or city-owned trees.

That doesn’t mean those restrictions are well-observed.

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Signs made of film plastic, which have the consistency of a thick plastic bag, said Kyle Lewis, director of Philadelphia’s recycling program, can’t be recycled and should be thrown away. Metal stands can be processed at a scrap metal facility, though the city won’t collect them for recycling. Campaign signs made of hard corrugated cardboard are recyclable, Lewis said, but it’s not clear Philadelphians are taking advantage of that.

“I can’t say we see a lot of it, honestly,” Lewis said. “Anecdotally, I have not seen a lot curbside.”