Fearing a rash of new cabarets after a federal judge struck down the city’s 17-year moratorium on new strip clubs, the City Council is planning to vote Monday to impose some of the strictest adult-entertainment regulations of any big city in the country.
No lap dances. No placing dollar bills in a dancer’s G-string. And the clubs must have what one council member likens to “Fred Meyer” lighting, a reference to the department store chain.
Last year, a man who hoped to open a club downtown sued. U.S. District Judge James Robart sided with him last month, ruling the moratorium an unconstitutional restraint on free speech. The city could wind up paying the man millions of dollars in damages.
In anticipation of the ruling, however, Democratic Mayor Greg Nickels came up with rules designed to make it easier to police strip clubs and to discourage new clubs from opening. The rules include requiring dancers to keep 4 feet from customers, barring the use of private rooms, barring customers from giving money directly to entertainers, and increasing the minimum lighting think parking-garage brightness.
The rules would also make the entertainers employees of a club instead of private contractors, which the city believes will make it easier to go after club owners when violations occur. In Seattle, most dancers pay about $150 per shift for the privilege of dancing in the club, and keep what they make in fees and tips.
Several suburban communities around Seattle already have the 4-foot rule, one reason clubs seek to open in Seattle, Nickels argues. The regulations “are necessary to protect the public health, safety, and general welfare of the citizens of Seattle,” he wrote in a letter to City Council.
It gives me a warm and fuzzy feeling to know that politicians are protecting me in such ways. Honestly the environment they are talking about creating sounds more like prom night than a strip joint. Maybe next somebody will propose making the dancers wear skirts which fall below the knees.
Has anyone done a study to see if STDs are more prevalent in states or countries where prostitution is legal. I’ll bet they are lower – just because the extramarital contacts benefit from regular testing. If so, then this bluenose argument about strip clubs is mute.
I agree with the above post, and furthermore, would like to see more feminists support legalized prostitution. Since it’s mostly women who are affected by the pimps, cops, johns, and STD’s, I don’t understand why feminist activists havn’t been more outspoken about it.
Are strip clubs required to report the cash the dancers receive? Or a portion of it? I’d imagine that if they don’t, it would piss off the local govt since they can’t get a piece of the action (no pun intended). Taxes.
Sounds like the Seattle govt needs some bucks and this is a threat?
oh btw – nice picture
Let’s face it. America’s full of prudes, who most likely go home and do the nastiest things. I’m from Australia and cant believe the fuss Americans make over sex. “OMG janet jackson got her titty out at the superbowl!”. Meh, it would have been a big nonevent here. From what i can gather from american tv, nudity is more dangerous than guns and violence. America needs to embrace it’s sexual decadence since Americans are all gagging for it anyway. 🙂
BTW, Australia has a brothel on the stock exchange… no joke.
Given Seattle’s past, I find this restriction incredibly comical. There was a point Seattle’s past when prostitution made up almost 50% of the city’s tax revenue.
Gillz….I’m an American IN America, and I don’t see what the fuss is about.
But, it stems from our original settlers, unlike Australia, instead of criminals, we were settled by Puritans and Quakers and other religious nutballs. There are lingering effects of it that we are STILL suffering through.
Meanwhile, I grew up in Nevada…and I thought prostitution was LEGAL everywhere, like it is in Nevada (given that a town must have a majority of the people vote for it, so most of the brothel towns were set up just for that purpose). It makes a lot more sense.
Chris, yeah…the IRS does have a line on “typical tips” for the industry, and yeah, they are required to claim it on tax returns.
Let’s see you can have a gay parade, with nude gays walking down the street, but you can’t have a strip club. I say outlaw both the nude street parades and the strip clubs. After all you don’t want to offend the muslims, do you? If a muslim attacks a stripper / gay, because of the koran, is that freedom of religion?
Where ever these clubs are they bring in all kinds of riff-raft. We should only have these in foreign countries, so that only the rich and influential can fornicate with poor and uneducated women { and little boys in} in the religious coutries of India and Southeast Asia. Or you could go to the Netherland’s red light district. If you get sick then maybe they can put you to sleep, then grind you up and make a cosmetic from the parts for a stripper. { Oh, that’s China, sorry }.
It’s better to be a pude and still have a civilization, than some degenerate country giving up their liberties for a false sense of security.
I hope they intend to outlaw the nudes from the next gay day parade.
No lap dances, no private rooms, no closer than four feet. Sounds like all my old girlfriends will be working there.
So I have this idea to save California’s budget crissis, and it involves competeing with Nevada…..
Any frustrated guys in Seattle can come to Portland, OR.
The State Supreme Court just ruled against a rule requiring dancers to stay 4-feet away from their audience.
http://www.publications.ojd.state.or.us/S49963.htm
I like the fact the Court ruled that cities can’t restrict expression in an attempt to restrict other behaviors
Mike Voice is right about Portland. I was out there about two years ago and nearly every bar had nude dancing. I mean at least one on every city block! It’s a titty-palooza out there.
I never actually stopped at any of them. My wife and kids probably wouldn’t have liked it. But I’m imagining the more nude dancing, the fewer good looking dancers there are per establishment. In other words, I’m guessing they’re not too good to look at.
“The regulations “are necessary to protect the public health, safety, and general welfare of the citizens of Seattle,””
Sounds like an attempt to regulate free expression. Or does the Mayor have evidence that lap dancing spreads diseases.
Legalize prostitution. Does anyone remember what prohibiting alcohol did? With the regulated industry, very few people still chose to drink bootleg booze after the repeal of prohibition.
Let me get this straight- you cannot get a lap dance from a female stripper in Seattle, Washington, but you can get a lap dance from a male prostitute on Capital Hill in Washington D.C.?
Feminists do support legalized prostitution. Hillary Clinton led the US delegation that took that position a few years back, eventually getting overruled by Islamic countries. The purpose of the conference was to deal with women kidnapped into brothels.
Ima…
yep it’s just like the football leagues…the more teams, the crummier the players.
Mmm, Robert, it’s more like although you cannot get a lap dance from a female stripper in Seattle….you also cannot have a woman sit on your lap on a train or bus without a pillow between you.
http://www.floydpinkerton.net/fun/laws.html
# In Seattle, women who sit on men’s laps on buses or trains without placing a pillow between them face an automatic 6 months in jail.
# In Seattle, it is illegal to carry a concealed weapon longer than 6 feet.
# It is illegal to pretend one’s parents are rich.
# In the state of Washington there is a law against having sex with a virgin under any circumstances. (Including the wedding night.)
So now I know why M$ software sucks. How can they concentrate with all those clubs around them? I guess most of those places will dry up when Vista tanks and the money begins to dwindle. : )
so what can people do to help stop this nonesense? I’ve been scanning blogs and news for hours, and while I’ve found a lot of interesting discourse, I have yet to find any kind of organized response beyond the current effort to collect signiatures.
I would love to get involved — any ideas?