Owner May Sue City Over Bar to ‘Adult Entertainment’ : Santee Council Again Stymies the Opening of Topless Club

Opponents of adult entertainment in this East County city have won yet another battle to delay the opening of a nightclub featuring topless dancing. But, both the would-be proprietors and city officials agree that Santee will not be able to keep out adult entertainment forever.

At its meeting Wednesday, the Santee City Council unanimously rejected a request by Sheldon Woods, part-owner of the Main Attraction clubs in Mission Valley and San Ysidro, for an exemption from the city’s 150-day moratorium on issuing adult entertainment licenses.

Attorney Paul Kerrigan said the decision--like the moratorium--was specifically intended to keep his client from converting the Casa Don Diego restaurant into a Main Attraction club. However, the fight against topless dancing is destined to fail, he said, since the city must adopt an ordinance regulating adult entertainment by June 18.

“There will be an adult entertainment establishment out here whether the people like it or not,” Kerrigan said.

And, if Wednesday’s public hearing on the matter is indicative of community sentiment, the people clearly do not like it.

A representative of the Santee Ministerial Council urged the city to continue its efforts to prevent adult entertainment in the city. Another speaker warned that permitting a topless dancing club would cause an increase in sex crimes.

“These people who go to these adult entertainment establishments are emotionally and sexually incited to commit rape, incest, child molestation and adultery,” Santee resident James Cheek said, adding that the incidence of sexually transmitted diseases such as herpes and AIDS would also increase.

“It is my personal opinion that anyone that would want to open this type of entertainment (business) is a pervert,” the opposing speaker said.

Woods has maintained that opposition to his club is limited to a small but vocal group of religious fundamentalists.

“There may be 20 or so people at a particular church who are against it, but . . . I don’t think most of the people are against it,” Woods said. “I think if it went on the ballot, it would pass by a big margin.”

However, city council members disagree, saying those who spoke in opposition to adult entertainment at the public hearing represent the consensus of the city’s residents.

“I think they reflect the mainstream thinking of the people of Santee,” Councilman Gerry Soloman said. “We are a family-related community and businesses like this can really destroy the city’s moral fiber.”

The dispute over topless dancing in Santee has been raging since last summer when Woods and his partners, William Stearns and Alexander Smith, applied for a sexually related business permit to open a club featuring topless dancing. The city’s planning staff turned them down, finding that the proposed site was within 600 feet of a church--the Word of Life Christian Church--in violation of the county zoning ordinance the city adopted when it incorporated in 1980.

But, according to Soloman, “a wrench was thrown into the machinery” when the church moved, removing the obstacle to approval of the adult entertainment license. This prompted the city council to pass an urgency ordinance prohibiting any adult entertainment businesses in Santee until the city could adopt its own ordinance.

However, U.S. District Court Judge Judith Keep struck down the city’s ordinance, ruling that it violated Woods’ First Amendment rights because it could prohibit topless dancing--a form of free expression--for as long as two years. The city then imposed a 150-day moratorium which Keep upheld.

Woods charged that the urgency ordinance was a “last-ditch effort” to keep him from opening his club.

“If they have laws on the books that say you can open up adult entertainment, they should stick by them,” Woods said. “I don’t think it’s right for any agency, when they are elected to serve the needs of the people . . . (to) turn around and play God and start making their own laws. Where do they get off?”

City officials insist that the moratorium was necessary to give the city’s planning staff time to develop an adult entertainment ordinance suited to Santee’s particular needs.

“What we are attempting to do as a new city is to plan for our community,” Soloman said. “To have allowed that adult entertainment business to come in without a comprehensive review would have been irresponsible.”

The ordinance allows for exemptions from the moratorium, providing the applicant can prove that the delay would cause irreparable financial damage, that the business would qualify under the impending adult entertainment ordinance and that granting the exemption would not affect future adult entertainment regulation.

Woods, who claims that his battle with the city has cost him $16,000 in legal fees and as much as $700,000 in lost revenue, applied for an exemption Feb. 7.

The city’s planning staff recommended that the council deny the request, contending that Woods offered no proof of financial hardship and that he could, if he wished, open a restaurant without topless dancing. The staff reported that it could not determine whether the club would qualify under the new ordinance, since it had yet to be drafted.

In his testimony before the council, Woods emphasized that he has received no significant complaints in seven years of operating the Main Attraction in a shopping center on Friars Road in San Diego.

“I have a perfect record,” he said. “I don’t cause any blight. My operation is a very classy operation.”

To this, Craig Stanley, assistant pastor of Christ the Vine Four-Square Baptist Church replied, “It may look classy, but down the road, we’re going to have pimps and prostitutes.”

Kerrigan said that such testimony swayed the council’s decision not to allow Woods to open his club until the 150-day moratorium ends.

“It’s very easy politically to sit back and say we were forced to provide that license but that we don’t want that kind of filth in the community,” Kerrigan said. “I’m sure they’re comfortable with the decision they’ve made and I’m sure their constituents are very happy with them. But that’s why there are courts and that’s why there’s a Constitution and we will move forward.”

Although he is convinced that the council violated the terms of its own ordinance in denying the exemption, Kerrigan said he would not file an injunction on those grounds. However, he added that Woods has retained Beverly Hills attorney Joshua Kaplan, a specialist in adult entertainment cases, and may sue the city to recoup his losses.

“As time wears on and my client’s pocketbook continues to be opened, much to his detriment, I can imagine that that kind of lawsuit would be filed, if only to recover legitimate costs incurred,” Kerrigan said.