Lauder, Inc. v. City of Houston, TX, No. 10-20802 (5th Cir. 2012)

Plaintiff appealed its First Amendment challenge to a newsrack ordinance enacted by the City in 2007. The ordinance required newsracks on the City's rights-of-way to meet certain material size, and placement standards and required publishers using newsracks to pay a permit fee. The court held that plaintiff's appeal was without merit where the City's ordinance's requirement were narrowly tailored to the City's substantial interests in public safety and aesthetics and left open the ample alternative means of distribution; the fees under the newsrack ordinance were consistent with the First Amendment because they defrayed the City's administrative costs; and as a content-neutral time, place, and manner restriction that did not leave enforcing officials with unbridled discretion, the newsrack ordinance need not contain an explicit provision for judicial review. Accordingly, the court rejected plaintiff's First Amendment challenges to the City's newsrack ordinance.