WESTPORT, MA — At an annual town meeting in Westport, MA last year, town officials passed a resolution establishing a limited adult business zone in anticipation of the arrival of the town’s first strip club.Prior to the passage of the resolution, an adult business could have been established in any commercially zoned portion of the town. The new resolution would satisfy the town’s obligations under the First Amendment – by providing somewhere for adult businesses to be established – while keeping most business districts off-limits.
The new resolution was not without its problems, one of which caught the eye of attorney Brian Corey Jr., who represents a group of investors called Deutche Donn in Fairhaven. Deutche Donn had already applied to open a strip club just east of the interchange between Routes 88 and Route 6, on property owned by local landowner Robert Machado
It seems that when the town crafted their adult business ordinance, Westport officials decided not to include Machado’s property in their newly designated “unrestricted business zone.”
Corey said he was dumbfounded when he saw that the new zone did not include the property where his clients intended to build their club.
“What they have consciously done is deny my client the opportunity to open a business in what would have amounted to a more discrete location,” Corey said following a meeting of the Westport Board of Selectmen earlier this year, according the Fall River, MA-based Herald News.
“I see this as nothing more than an attempt by the town to infringe upon my client’s Constitutionally-protected rights,” added Corey.
As a result of the way the adult business zone was drawn, Corey did what any attorney in his shoes would do – he filed a lawsuit against Westport, asserting that the town was violating his clients’ constitutional rights.
Now, wishing to avoid a drawn-out court battle against Corey and his clients, the Westport planning board says it will recommend that the adult business zone be amended to include Machado’s property, and reduced in other areas, accordingly.
According to EastBayRI.com, all three planning board members made their disdain for adult businesses known, even as they concluded that amending the unrestricted business zone was a prudent move.
“I can’t imagine the Founding Fathers imagined something like strip clubs [when they passed the First Amendment],” commented Wayne Sunderland, who cast the dissenting vote in the board’s 2-1 decision to recommend amending the adult zone.
Machado countered that the “First Amendment allows a business like this to be established.”
“You can’t dodge it without a lot of litigation,” added Machado, according to EastBayRI.com. “If under the First Amendment it has to exist, you have to live with it.”
Sunderland said he thinks it makes no sense to allow strip clubs to build off Route 6, because the town is actively trying to draw other types of businesses to the area. He referred to Route 6 as a “financial asset” that will be “hurt” by the presence of strip clubs.
Chairman of the Planning Board John Montano concurred that strip clubs were unwanted, but noted that the town selectmen want to “avoid lengthy and costly litigation against the town.”
Montano added that adult businesses will “degrade the neighborhood wherever it is,” so it made sense to put the strip club “where it does the least harm.”
According to EastBayRI.com, several audience members voiced opposition to strip clubs opening anywhere in town.
“It’s very clear the town does not want it,” board member Phil Hudner said, noting the displeasure of the assembled citizenry.
Hudner noted that the area surrounding the proposed location of the club is largely wetlands and decommissioned railroad tracks, which will tend to limit the addition other adult businesses – all the more reason to make that area the adult zone, Hudner reasoned.
Westport resident Nancy Cook said that people who want to go to strip clubs should make the drive to New Bedford or Dartmouth, and suggested that town officials should take a survey among taxpayers to see if the majority want to allow strip clubs in Westport, and predicted that once businesses are established there, the adult businesses will keep local law enforcement busy.
“I have a feeling the police will be on Route 6 a lot,” said Cook.
