Strip Club News

The city of Seattle is getting its first new strip club in almost two decades later this year. The Deja Vu chain of clubs is planning to open a gentlemen’s club in the basement of Fantasy Unlimited, an erotic boutique and theater.

Interestingly, this new strip club is opening just feet from the very courthouse where a federal judge struck down the city’s ban on strip clubs as unconstitutional two years ago.

The last new strip club to open in Seattle was in the late 1980s. Five new clubs opened in a short period of time, prompting the city council to pass a 180-day moratorium on new strip clubs. This ban was repeatedly extended for the next 17 years until it was struck down by the Court.

As a result of the court ruling in 2005, Seattle passed new regulations such as a ban on lap dancing to discourage new clubs from opening in the city. City residents voided the restrictions by a two-to-one ratio in a vote on the issue in November 2006.

The new club will be located at 2027 Westlake Ave., Seattle, WA. There is an existing Deja Vu in the city of Seattle.

The Houston, Texas, Vice Squad is out in full force cracking down on strip clubs after a recent federal court ruling gave the city the go-ahead to begin enforcing its decade-old sexually oriented business ordinance. Just this month, several arrests have been made and a few clubs have been cited for various ordinance violations.

Undercover Houston police posed as customers at Treasures on Westheimer Road for weeks gathering evidence on suspects who allegedly offered to sell sexual services, resulting in several arrests. Police also hit Solid Platinum and arrested a half dozen employees for various charges such as prostitution, drug possession, and outstanding warrants.

(Let’s be fair: often allegations of prostitution at strip clubs are nothing more than a dancer sitting on an undercover officer’s lap or inadvertently brushing her breast against his him while giving a dance. These arrests aren’t always made for offers of real sex acts such as oral sex, hand jobs, or intercourse, but often made for things nobody in their right mind would call prostitution.)

Houston law prohibits nudity or the display of the female areola in any establishment that is within 1,500 feet of any school, church, public park, or licensed daycare center or is within 1,000 feet of a similarly licensed establishment. The fact that these exposed breasts are behind closed doors and are unable to be seen by passersby is of no consequence. Just the fact that there are exposed nipples behind closed doors where only consenting adults can see them makes them illegal.

Some people think that Houston’s ordinance could result in the closing of most of the city’s strip clubs. Some gentlemen’s clubs that are currently topless may be forced to convert to bikini clubs because they are too close to schools or churches. This distance of 1,500 feet is completely arbitrary and is intended stamp out the strip clubs that are enjoyed by many thousands of free-thinking, consenting Houston adults every year. Why did Houston stop at 1,500 feet? Why not 15,000 feet?

Houston police promise more crackdowns and raids in the near future.

Houston, TX, Sexually Oriented Business Ordinances

New Mexico state Senator John Grubesic (DFL, pictured on the right) has proposed a $5 tax on strip club patrons similar to one currently on the books in Texas.

The Texas “Pole Tax” went into effect at the top of 2008. It is currently being challenged in the courts. Late last month, a Texas judge upheld the tax. There is a hearing scheduled for Jan. 22nd on club owners’ request that a judge bar collection of the fee by the state. The supposed rationale for this Texas strip club tax is that gentlemen’s clubs contribute to the commission of sex crimes (patently false), so the money raised will be partly used to help victims of sexual assault.

“It’s $5. That’s nothing. I think beer in these places runs around five bucks,” Grubesic was quoted as saying.

But what is to stop these freedom-robbing politicians from raising the tax even higher? If their ultimate goal is to shut down strip clubs and rob free-thinking, consenting adults from enjoying this type of entertainment, what is to stop them from raising the tax to $20 per patron? Or $50? There is absolutely nothing to stop them—if the courts do not. Just as your other taxes go up and up every year, you can expect this one to go up as well.

This is a clear and unmistakable infringement on the Constitutional rights of citizens. It is a tax on expression, nothing else. Millions of Americans go to strip clubs every year. The vast majority of strip club patrons are not perpetrators of sex crimes—or any other type of crime. They should not be singled out for special taxation just because they enjoy a particular form of expression targeted by grandstanding politicians.

If this attack on free speech is upheld by idiot judges, what will be allowed to be attacked next? Perhaps a tax on patrons of rap concerts? Or maybe a tax on romance novels? How about a tax on gay cross-dressing performances? Gays have the highest rate of HIV infection. How about the state tax their expression then use part of the money raised to treat HIV infections, with the rest going to the general fund to be squandered? We can apply this twisted logic to all sorts of different scenarios with the same end result: it is a tax on speech that is supposed to be protected by the United States Constitution.

NM Senator John Grubesic’s homepage

The Crazy Horse in Clayton, North Carolina, caught fire and burned early on January 6, 2008. Fire destroyed most of the building, leaving it a complete loss. Club owners say they will rebuild and reopen.

This Crazy Horse is one of six clubs in the Pure Gold chain. It was a topless membership club that served alcohol. It opened in 1998 and employed around 80 people.

The club was facing $5,000 in fines and a 10-day suspension after allegations of dancers engaging in lewd conduct such as exposing themselves to patrons and allowing customers to join upon entering instead of requiring a three-day waiting period back in 2007.

Video from the fire