Skimping on the Beachfront

At a recent Hermosa Beach City Council meeting, Mayor Robert “Bergie” Benz proposed ridding the city of a 12-year-old law that prohibits women from going topless or wearing G-string bikinis to the beach. The City Council will review the law at Tuesday’s meeting. TRACY JOHNSON spoke with the mayor and several beachgoers.

ROBERT “BERGIE” BENZ

Mayor, Hermosa Beach

Iput this on the agenda, quite frankly, to stir the pot. There is this continual problem in government with laws on the books that are rarely or selectively enforced. There are about 200 laws in the city code that are selectively enforced. There are a lot of other stupid laws like you can’t wash your car in front of your house or play Frisbee or football on the beach. I picked this law to make a point because no one has ever been cited for going topless or wearing a G-string, yet it’s all too obvious that on a sunny weekend afternoon you’re going to see women at the beach wearing little.

Laws that aren’t enforced cheapen other laws and give an incredible amount of power to the few complainers in town. There are a lot of people who say that if we get rid of the law it will bring out all kinds of topless sunbathers and people wearing G-strings, but that argument is asinine. It’s like saying that if you got rid of the law that prohibits drinking on the beach, everyone on the beach would be drunk.

People in this community have said that I’m a lawbreaker and that I took an oath to uphold the laws of this city. But it’s unconstitutional for me to uphold a law that’s selectively enforced.

SHAWN MOONAN

38, executive recruiter, Hermosa Beach

If there is selective enforcement of this law, we need to get some leadership and have the law enforced. The mayor seems to think that if we enforce the law we’ll lose money, but to me that says we have the law so we can make money on “T&A.;”

It’s not like there are thousands of women out there going topless. Getting rid of this law is not good for the community. If we allow people to go topless it gives the people who want to be exhibitionists a green light to come down to the beach. There are a lot of selfish people saying, “If I want to go to the beach like that, I should be able to.”

But what if you have a family and you don’t want to go to a beach like that? I don’t want to bring my kids to a beach that has an environment of topless women, and I don’t think a lot of other people do either.

LISA SHANNON

36, model, Woodland Hills

Igo to the beach regularly and I wear a G-string. I think it’s like freedom of speech; you should be able to wear what you want to wear. It’s a fashion.

There are nude beaches and a lot of people go topless at the beach. I don’t know what the big deal is. What’s the difference? It gives you a better tan (to wear a G-string); there’s no tan lines.

The only way I think it would affect people like families is if they were raised to feel uncomfortable about seeing some skin. It’s just a body. It’s not a big deal. If you have that big a problem with it then you shouldn’t go to the beach.