[RubHer Yellow Ducky]

Olema's new sign: Obama, Calif., population 55Jim Staats
Article Launched: 09/19/2008 08:38:17 PM PDT


Barack Obama supporter Kelly Emery, owner of Olema Cottages, created an Obama sign that mimics the town s population sign. She placed it along Sir Francis Drake Boulevard. (IJ photo/Jeff Vendsel)


Related

• 'Obama' Olema sign taken down

} Olema resident Kelly Emery's sign of the times is stirring up a bit of small-town political excitement.
The 48-year-old Emery - a supporter of Sen. Barack Obama for president - installed a road sign outside her Olema Cottages bed and breakfast on Sir Francis Drake Boulevard this week that mimics other town limit signs, except that it renames the area "Obama."
"It's really just an artistic expression," said Emery, who has run the West Marin bed and breakfast near the Highway 1 intersection for eight years. "There's something about his name that plays tricks on you. I love our Olema sign and it would make me think graphically of Obama and I just thought it'd be fun to make a sign that would hopefully make people do a double-take."
Emery, who built the 10-foot-tall wood sign and installed it near the road Wednesday, has heard nothing but positive comments from neighbors and others. One couple stopped the car, got out and took a photograph of themselves next to the sign.
"That just made me so happy," Emery said.
Curtis Havel, a Marin County senior planner, said county code allows for political signs on one's residence or place of business provided the sign is displayed not more than 45 days prior to, or more than 10 days after, an election.
The 45-day countdown to the Nov. 4 election begins Sunday. "If it was not on her property, she would need to put it on her property," Havel said.