Permalink

Methuen councilor hopes to widen strip club buffer

By J.J. Huggins
JHUGGINS@EAGLETRIBUNE.COM
Published: August 19, 2008

METHUEN — Nobody is proposing to open an adult entertainment business in town — not yet anyway.

With lurid signs and suggestive names like Kittens and Moonlight Reader, strip clubs and pornography stores have angered local residents, who say "not in my backyard."

And that is what Methuen is hoping to do: keep "adult" businesses away from residential neighborhoods while still complying with a U.S. Supreme Court ruling saying communities cannot simply ban them.

"What we're attempting to do is put in place rules and regulations at the local level that to the fullest extent possible under the law, block the arrival of any potential adult business," said Mayor William Manzi.

Adult entertainment became a topic of discussion when officials recently updated the city's master zoning plan.

The city's zoning law says adult businesses cannot open within a half-mile of a drinking establishment but says they only have to be a quarter-mile away from homes.

City Councilor Kenneth Willette wants to increase the buffer zone so that adult businesses must also be at least a half-mile away from homes.

"To have an adult entertainment facility within a quarter-mile of your home, I don't think anybody would want that," Willette saisd. He has filed a proposed amendment to the zoning ordinance with the City Council to increase the buffer.

Officials are reviewing it to make sure that if it is passed by the council, the amendment would still allow adult businesses somewhere in the city. A complete ban would subject the city to lawsuits, Willette said.

"Unfortunately, according to the Constitution, you need to have at least one area of your community that could be zoned for adult entertainment," he said.

Residents fear a "certain element of people" who patronize strip clubs and adult bookstores. They are concerned about property values dropping if those businesses pop up in their neighborhood, Willette said.

In Windham, N.H., a Florida developer, Dean Cohen, submitted plans last year to build a high-end club and pub with dance stages and private booths featuring topless women at 20 Rockingham Road (Route 28).

The plans sparked concerns, but Emmett Horgan, owner of two car dealerships in Salem, N.H., put the issue to rest when he bought the property Cohen was considering last month.

Windham selectmen Chairman Dennis Senibaldi said a strip club would have been bad for the town.

"Definitely economically, it can hurt the town because who is going to want to be next to a strip club except for another strip club?" he said.

In Methuen, adult entertainment establishments can open in "business highway" and "limited industrial" zones. Once you factor in the half-mile buffer from bars and the quarter-mile distance they must maintain from homes, there are few places left that fit the bill, said Karen Sawyer, director of the city Economic and Community Development Office.

"They're very remote," she said.