Ohio strip-club owners said most of them would be forced to shut down under a bill that passed the Ohio Senate yesterday despite a lack of enthusiasm from members of both political parties.
Close look might send you to jail
4/24/07
By Bob Dyer
No wonder blue-collar Ohioans are fleeing the state.
A lack of jobs is only part of it. Even if you have a job, what are you going to do after work? You can't smoke. You can't gamble. You can't drink more than two beers. And now you might not be able to come within six feet of a stripper! Why would anybody stay? But seriously... what in the name of Mae West is the state legislature thinking? Our lawmakers can't figure out how to finance public education and they're debating how far away you can sit from a stripper? Let's see... five feet is too close... seven feet is too far... that's it! Six feet! Why, if we can keep all of our citizens six feet from a stripper, people will be flocking back from Florida and Arizona! Read
STRIP-CLUB BILL
Senate approves limits on dancers
April 18, 2007
By Jim Siegel
Ohio strip-club owners said most of them would be forced to shut down under a bill that passed the Ohio Senate yesterday despite a lack of enthusiasm from members of both political parties.
Senate Bill 16, created through a petition effort by the Cincinnati-based Citizens for Community Values, says dancers cannot come within 6 feet of patrons and prohibits nude dancing between midnight and 6 a.m.
The House also is likely to approve the measure, said House Speaker Jon A. Husted, R-Kettering. Gov. Ted Strickland has not yet had a chance to review the bill, a spokesman said.
Though it got overwhelming support, passing the Senate 24-8, some senators said later that they weren't sure why it was brought up for a vote, or that they'd rather let Citizens for Community Values take it to the ballot. Politically, though, it wasn't worth voting against it, they said.
"If we want to be honest with each other … I suggest to you that if it were a silent vote, I'm not sure it would pass," said Sen. Larry A. Mumper, R-Marion, one of three Republicans to vote no. "That's something to think about."
Barry Sheets, a lobbyist for Citizens for Community Values, told senators that the proposal was about one thing: reducing crime, including violence, drug use and prostitution.
"Our intent has never been to shut down adult businesses," he said.
But Ohio club owners said that's disingenuous, because it's well-known that much of their $250 million in annual business is done after midnight. The 6-foot rule, they argue, would be logistically impossible for some small clubs to meet.
No senator yesterday argued that the bill was vitally necessary in light of a strip-club law passed last year, nor was there strong committee testimony from local government officials or law enforcement arguing that a change in law was needed.
A year ago, the Senate had the chance to pass similar statewide strip-club standards after the measure was approved by the House. Instead, Senate leaders merely gave townships the ability to get help from the state attorney general in developing their own guidelines.
At the time, Citizens for Community Values leader Phil Burress said Senate President Bill M. Harris had betrayed him, allowing strip clubs to "hijack" the bill. In late 2005, Harris said he felt Burress was trying to bully him into passing the bill by threatening to spend money to defeat unsupportive GOP senators.
After the Senate passed the weakened measure last year, Burress' group gathered more than 100,000 petition signatures to bring the tougher bill back to the legislature. If the General Assembly doesn't pass it in its current form, the group can circulate another set of petition forms to put the proposal on the statewide ballot.
Harris, R-Ashland, still has nothing nice to say about Burress.
"But in this case, where they went to the voters and got signatures, we've reacted to that," Harris said. "We put it before our members to vote, and it passed. That's the way the system works."
Passing statewide standards now instead of in 2006 also avoided concerns about the re-election of Sen. David Goodman, R-New Albany. One reason Senate leaders took statewide strip-club standards out of the bill in 2006 was Goodman's opposition, and the fear that the vote could hurt him at the ballot.
Goodman won in November. He voted against the bill yesterday, half-joking that he can already envision future ads saying he supports lap dances.
"I am very, very concerned about walking down the road of creating community standards at the state level," Goodman said. "I think this is a very dangerous precedent."
Senate Democrats tried a number of procedural maneuvers to stop the bill, all of which were rejected by Republicans. Six of 11 Democrats voted for the measure, which didn't surprise Minority Leader Teresa Fedor, D-Toledo, who voted no.
"Everything can be used against you," she said. "It may not be good public policy, but politically, who can vote against it?" jsiegel@dispatch.comRead
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