Police Panel OKs Nude Club Despite Outcry

Over the strong objections of church leaders, educators, a Los Angeles police official and Lincoln Heights residents, the Police Commission’s permit review panel said Wednesday that it had no choice but to approve a nude dancing club’s application to do business in the Eastside neighborhood.

More than a dozen opponents of the club, called Industrial Strip L.A., begged the panel to do whatever it could to deny or delay allowing the club to open Friday night, citing the Lacy Street site’s proximity to several schools and a gang-ridden community that can ill afford any more bad influences.

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But after listening to nearly an hour of impassioned objections to the club, one panelist explained that while she sympathized with the opponents--and with their argument that they had just learned of the site owner’s intentions--the panel could not consider zoning or other issues.

“But for the fact that I don’t live in Lincoln Heights, I would be sitting in the audience with you,” said panel member Bobbie Jean Anderson. “We have no jurisdiction to deny a permit--we don’t even have any reason to deny it.”

In an impromptu huddle during a break in the proceedings, Los Angeles City Councilman Mike Hernandez tried to prepare a crowd of more than 100 objectors for a defeat by promising that he would continue to fight the club owners, who have another establishment in North Hollywood.

“It’s not something that ends today,” he told the residents. “We have a long road to go.”

Among his first plans for attack, he told them, is to try to create City Council legislation that would take a tougher look at such so-called mixed-use zoning. Although the site is zoned as an industrial area, which would allow it to support adult entertainment clubs, it is also a residential area with nearby homes and schools, and is across the street from an animal shelter where high school students earn credit for their work with the pets.

And if the council can’t help, Hernandez said, he will seek remedy through the courts.

“We’re trying to create jobs in that community, but I don’t think these are the jobs we’re trying to create,” Hernandez told the panel.

“This is where I grew up and this is what I care about.”

For the club’s part, attorney Roger Jon Diamond said that if the community would just give it a chance, the nonalcoholic adult establishment would prove a boon to the area by bringing wealthy customers to Lincoln Heights and by contributing to the fight against crime by staking its private security officers around the club.

Beyond that, Diamond said, his clients have constitutional rights in protecting their business.

“In our country, for better or worse, minorities have protection against majorities,” Diamond shouted over the jeers of the crowd. “In America we have to have a presumption of innocence and give somebody a chance to operate.”

Club owners say they will abide by regulations barring liquor, food and touching. Dancers will perform nude and cubicles have been built along the wall for private dances. Cover charges will be $5 during the day and $10 at night and the club will be open roughly from 11 a.m. until 2 a.m., Diamond said.

Community activists, including nuns and school principals, gathered more than 900 signatures in opposition to the club, which will be the first adult establishment in their neighborhood. They promised in several meetings leading up to Wednesday’s show of force to make their neighborhood inhospitable to Industrial Strip.

If necessary, they said, they will picket and publish pictures of customers entering the business in hopes of scaring them away.

Among other tactics, Hernandez said he and his team will watch the club carefully for any illicit activities that could qualify as public nuisances--loud music, lewd conduct, public drunkenness. It would take at least four citations to warrant a temporary closure, police said.

In addition to claiming that the site was improperly given a zoning permit, he attempted to designate a grassy area adjacent to the animal shelter as a park.

Adult clubs are barred from operating near public parks but that attempt failed because the permit application was already in progress.

The Lincoln Heights Chamber of Commerce also opposed the club.

“We’ll try to be on them as much as we can so that they’re not successful,” said chamber President Steve Kasten.

Capt. Bruce Hagerty, who heads the LAPD’s Hollenbeck Division, said he is obligated to weigh the best interests of the community against the best interests of a business person when considering his recommendation.

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But he said his decision to oppose the club was a “no-brainer,” because he would probably have to divert his officers to protect the club’s patrons, deal with the crime the club could attract and respond to neighborhood noise and behavior complaints.

The owners, confident of approval, began advertising Friday’s grand opening three days before the panel’s final endorsement.

They bought a building next door, knocked it down and built a parking lot to meet all permit requirements. They have signed a 25-year lease, which would give them some leverage if a buyout was suggested, Hernandez said.

“It looks like they plan on staying and having lucrative business,” said Sgt. Mike Peterson.

The other location has been cited for lewd conduct, but the North Hollywood vice officers say the owners are much more cooperative than other strip club operators.

“What about the rights of the neighborhood?” Esther Rodarte asked the panelists, “the people who want to keep that type of element out of our area?”