It's inevitable.  When reviewing your municipal ordinances, you will run into a provision that contains ambiguous language.  This discovery will lead to a rash of questions: Does the language need to be amended?  Would the ordinance be upheld by the court?  Is the ordinance overbroad?

Recently, the Ingham County Circuit Court held a Michigan State University ordinance unconstitutionally overbroad. In this case, a MSU student received a parking citation and subsequently approached the parking enforcement officer who issued the citation.  The student demanded the officer's name and eventually captured his picture with a cell phone.  During this confrontation, the parking officer was in the process of having an unrelated car towed away.  The student's demand for the parking enforcement officer's name was sufficient to establish a violation of MSU Ordinance 15.05, which states:

No person shall disrupt the normal activity or molest the property of any person, firm, or agency while that person, firm, or agency is carrying out service, activity or agreement for or with the University.

The student was charged with a violation of the ordinance, which he challenged as unconstitutional.

So exactly how does a court determine whether an ordinance is overbroad?  First, a court must determine whether the ordinance reaches a substantial amount of constitutionally protected conduct (e.g. speech).  Here, the court found that "the ordinance, by barring any person from '[disrupting] the normal activity' of such a person, firm or agency...obviously criminalizes an extremely broad range of speech."

Second, the court will determine whether the ordinance is narrowly tailored to prohibit disorderly conduct or "fighting words" (those that by their very utterance inflict injury or tend to incite an immediate breach of the peace).  Again, the court found that the MSU ordinance severely restricted constitutionally protected speech and was not narrowly tailored to prohibit only disorderly conduct or fighting words.

Finally, the court will search for enforcement standards.  If the ordinance provides the police with unfettered discretion to determine what qualifies as a violation, the ordinance is likely to be overbroad.  Here, "the question of what constitutes 'disrupting the normal activity' of someone associated with MSU is an extremely subjective determination."

The Circuit Court was clear that criminalizing such speech in unconstitutional, citing the United States Supreme Court case City of Huston, Texas v Hill:

The freedom of individuals verbally to oppose or challenge police action without thereby risking arrest is one of the principal characteristics by which we distinguish a free nation from a police state.

The Ingham County Prosecutor's office has indicated it will appeal the Circuit Court's decision; however, municipal officials should review their ordinances for similar provisions.