Maybe Louisville officials were thinking it was better to ask forgiveness than permission.

That’s one explanation for why the Possibility City branding campaign (led by the Red7e ad agency and GLI) began publicizing its idea to shine laser images on the sides of buildings in downtown Indianapolis to promote all that’s possible in Louisville. They got the Mauyor’s office to send out a press release about it. Maybe the publicity was the big mistake.

Word spread quickly yesterday, and ultimately got to local officials in Indianapolis, where it didn’t take long to put a kibosh on the light show idea. Turns out you have to get permits to fire laser images on public buildings. Mounting a surprise laser attack might have allowed the campaign to get away with it.

Imagine some other city announcing plans to come down to Fourth Street Live and start plastering advertising image on the sides of the Starks Building. I don’t think so.

So the brains behind the idea have come up with an alternative plan — to produce the light show tonight at Fourth Street Live. They’ve already invested about $5,000 in the idea, so they may as well get some use from it. They’re covering up, saying that at least it’s possible to do the light show here, but not there. But this time they’re talking with the owners of the buildings before doing it.

There’s a meeting this morning at Fourth Street Live as officials analyze the screw-up and figure out how to make this sound better that what it really is — a colossal mistake in planning and P.R.