You have to admire a guy willing to mix profanity and store signs to express your opinions of the mayor of your town.

Herman contends Polk City for years has harassed him with zoning violations, tied him up with lawyers and sent squad cars to deliver letters to his Johnston home in a bid to embarrass him. Polk City, for its part, has alleged that Herman ran an illegal salvage operation from 300 Sandpiper Court and routinely dumped vehicle fluids into the city's storm sewers.

The dispute, which spills through five Polk County court files, turned nasty last fall, when the Mighty Good sign for three days described Polk City Mayor Gary Heuertz as "a lieing little Nazi turd."

The commentary returned last week, when Herman's sign began telling Polk City residents that "Our mayor and council sure are ass holes."

City leaders say Herman's messages have drawn complaints from some residents - mostly parents who came across them while transporting small, reading-age children - but insist that the city has no plans to try to interfere with his right to free speech.

"A lot of people are coming out of the woodwork to look at it," Heuertz said of the sign. "So tourism's not a problem ... .

"I guess it's a good display of the intellectual level we're dealing with."

Herman, who moved to the Des Moines area from Sigourney in 1999, said his Polk City problems peaked in March 2007, when 14 law enforcement officers descended on Mighty Good for a "routine title audit." The audit ultimately sparked Herman's August 2007 arrest on misdemeanor charges, later dropped, of running an illegal salvage operation.

Among other things, Herman complains that he since has had problems getting access to public documents and that police call his home at odd hours for no reason.

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