In battle of sex shop billboards, a sign arrives from above

God.

The fight is hard to miss. Within two-thirds of a mile, eight big billboards, all in line, vie for the attention of northbound drivers.

It’s a forest of advertising. Three signs, each 48 feet by 14 feet, tout the Lion’s Den adult “super store” at Exit 113. Three more, just as big but, given their hot-pink color, even more arresting, tout competitor Xcite (Exit 106).

And in the midst of the billboards beckoning shoppers to stores offering sex toys and pornographic videos are equally large signs declaring that “Porn Destroys Love” and asking if you’ve “Got God?”

“It wasn’t planned that way,” said Ronald Boda, who owns all eight of the billboard towers. “It just kind of came about.”

Originally, Boda had rented space on three of the towers to an adult store called Spice but pulled down its signs because of payment issues, he said. When the spaces opened up, he said, Lion’s Den took them over.

Around the same time, Boda was building more towers along the stretch of highway. With new advertising opportunities opening, Xcite, which by then had opened at the Spice location and was competing with Lion’s Den, wanted in, Boda said.

“Then one thing led to another,” he said.

Up went the three Xcite signs.

Which was too much for Jim Guell. Guell, 73, is a retired insurance broker, a member of the Knights of Columbus and a resident of the Ashwood Grove mobile home park. Ashwood Grove is directly across Highway 41 from the billboards.

“I got tired of seeing those advertisements, those boards, every time I came home,” Guell said. “I look out the window of my home and they’re lit at night and I thought, I’ve got to combat this some way.”

Guell hasn’t been in either store, but said he had “had a problem” with pornography as a younger man, “so I know what kind of damage can be done and how much of an addiction it can turn out to be.”

He contacted the Knights of Columbus and Morality in Media, a national anti-pornography group. With design help from Morality in Media and money from the Knights, Guell rented one of Boda’s billboards for six months. It cost about $6,000, Guell said.

Meanwhile, Boda had given away space on another of his billboards to the Kaiser Christian Fund Inc. of Green Bay. That’s where the “Got God?” sign is posted.

Boda said the “Got God?” billboard has nothing to do with the sex shops, and Harold Scott, president of Kaiser Christian Fund, said the organization hadn’t actually contracted for the space but was only lending use of its name.

“He gave me permission to use his graphics and they sent me a copy of it, so I had a sign made and put it up there,” Boda said. “I felt obligated. God’s been good to me. It’s hard taking a solid religious stand when you believe in the freedom of speech.

“It’s been a conflicting issue for me this whole time, but what do you do? What do you do?”