ROCK huffs and puffs as Dalby, 1Si hurriedly wash their hands of the Sellersburg Town Council's AEC.

That didn't take long. The story begins here: Juvenile or adult? Sellersburg Town Council sleeps with ROCK, awakes to fleas and incredulity. Thanks T.

As an added bonus, Evening News columnist Debbie Harbeson gets in on the ROCKin’ good time. Anyone seen Steve Burks?

From: Michael Dalby
Date: February 16, 2011 5:03:42 PM EST
To: Recipient
Subject: FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

One Southern Indiana releases statement regarding Sellersburg, Indiana’s proposed Adult Entertainment Commission

NEW ALBANY, Ind. – (February 16, 2011) – One Southern Indiana is responding to reports the organization is slated to provide a representative for a proposed Adult Entertainment Commission in Sellersburg, Indiana. Prior to various news reports published on February 15, 2011, neither One Southern Indiana nor its representatives was aware of any plans for such a commission or any requirement that it provide representation.

One Southern Indiana was and continues to be uninvolved in the formation of this commission and cannot comment on how the Sellersburg Town Council determined the validity of this information.

About One Southern Indiana: (snipped)

Juvenile or adult? Sellersburg Town Council sleeps with ROCK, awakes to fleas and incredulity.

David Mann of the Evening News drew the short straw and witnessed one of the most inadvertently hilarious legislative decisions in recent memory, this one occurring in Sellersburg.

Following is the entire first part of Mann's article, detailing the Town Council's request to invite unelected bodies like Reclaim Our Culture Kentuckiana (ROCK) and One Southern Indiana (1Si) to participate in opening a Pandora's Box larger than any ever imagined by the likes of Steve Price.

Sellersburg regulates live adult entertainment; New ordinance requires licenses for businesses, entertainers

The Sellersburg Town Council is now regulating live adult entertainment businesses.

Under the ordinance, which was approved unanimously during a Monday night meeting, adult businesses and the entertainers working therein have to pay a $5,000 licensing application fee, with a yearly renewal cost of $4,000. In order to be approved for the license, they have to provide basic information such as name, Social Security number, date of birth and written statements from three “bona fide residents of Clark County setting forth that the applicant is of good moral character.”

The ordinance says the business must have the license posted at all times and entertainers themselves have to keep their license affixed to their person at all times. Further, it establishes a seven-member Adult Entertainment Commission empowered to issue the licenses. Also, if a license is rejected, the town keeps $1,000 of the application fee to cover regulatory costs.

The commission has to include one clergyman or minister, two Democrats, two Republicans, one representative from One Southern Indiana and at least two members have to be female.

Town Council President Brian Meyer, said the ordinance has been more than a year in the making.

“It came from seeing what other communities have gone through without an ordinance,” he said.

Recent enforcement of adult business regulations in Louisville could send businesses looking for a new place to set up shop, he said, noting that the town doesn’t have any establishments to which the ordinance would apply.

Town Attorney Perry McCall said the town modeled its ordinance after similar regulations in Spencer County. The town also sought input from Reclaim Our Culture Kentuckiana, also known as ROCK, a group that opposes the businesses around the region.

The ordinance applies only to live entertainment. Councilman Paul Rhodes said he would like to eventually amend it to regulate retailers of adult books, videos and accessories.

The measure was approved unanimously in two readings.

As for the suggested composition of the regulatory commission, why must there be a clergyman or minister?

If the council intends to violate every known church-state separation, can't it be inclusive and have a Druids or an Imam, too?

Why on earth is One Southern Indiana involved with this?

Why? Isn't a doomed model of oligarchic economic development enough for one organization's everyday activities?

Does it go all the way back to Kerry Stemler's infamous public tango with ROCK, the closest equivalent we have to the style and intent of the Inquisition?

Wasn't Stemlers pole (poll?) dance with ROCK so appallingly ridiculous that even Michael Dalby disavowed it?

R.O.C.K. on, One Southern Indiana ... but first, please answer these inconvenient questions. (2007)

Speaking of dancers with 1Si-approved licenses dangling from their shielded boobies, will these same entertainers now become a staple of iSi's 5 o'Clock Network functions?

It might improve attendance, guys, but I suppose that the Ayatollah Wickens would prefer seeing them swaddled in parkas and furry caps, Russian-style, which is where Dostoevsky wrote ... well, you know.

You might not, actually; will The Brothers Karamazov survive the Town Council's future scrutiny?

I point to this passage: "Amend it to regulate retailers of adult books, videos and accessories."

If you think that such a clause would only benignly apply to the likes of Cleopatra's sticky offerings, you really haven't been paying attention to the history of censorship under the aegis of various Moral Minorities in American history.

Try reading about them ... if you can still find the book at Sellersburg's soon-to-be ROCK and 1Si-approved library.

One more thing which is relevant to New Albany.

I missed the last council meeting, but an attendee reports that Rev. Steve Burks, recently elected to the township board and a Republican primary candidate for council in the sixth district -- where NABC's original location does business -- asked if, given new regulations in Louisville, the council was ready to let the experienced folks from ROCK come in and help them craft an ordinance.

That'd be an unconstitutional ordinance, sports fans, just like the one Sellersburg has now passed. Someone call a team of high priced lawyers, please, as overpaying to rectify constitutional frivolity seems to be the game ROCK wishes us all to play these days.

By request: Further non-boring discussion about strippers.

Yesterday, almost two weeks after NAC broke the II Horseshoes strip club story and examined the contents of the seven-year-old ordinance that supposedly regulates economic development of this sordid variety, the Tribune provided City Hall with a de facto forum to declare its impotence when it comes to enforcement of its own laws.

Is there a type of Viagra to assist in this sort of dysfunction? Stupid question, I suppose, considering that we wouldn't be able to afford it even if Steve Price didn't vote against it.

Strip club doesn’t meet New Albany city ordinance, by Daniel Suddeath.

… (New Albany City Councilman Dan) Coffey figured he would know about II Horseshoes Gentleman’s Club, which opened two weeks ago at 1720 Old River Road, since a 2001 ordinance passed by the council
requires adult entertainment clubs to pay heavy fees to locate in the city.

“Something like this doesn’t happen without somebody knowing about it,” he said.

City Attorney Shane Gibson does know about it, but said the standing ordinance would likely fail in court if the city attempts to enforce it …

… Gibson said the ordinance was patterned after laws from other cities. The only problem is many of those cities have lost court cases trying to
uphold those measures, according to Gibson.

“I think most people who would look at the ordinance would say it clearly restricts freedom of speech,” Gibson said, adding he consulted other legal experts about the ordinance before deciding not to pursue the fees from II Horseshoes.

Gibson believes there are 10 areas in the ordinance that wouldn’t be upheld by courts. He said in tough economic times for the city, risking losing money in a shaky legal case wouldn’t be wise.

Attorney Gibson’s reasoning is impeccable within the constraining framework of the city’s traditional mantra of despair in the face of heavy lifting.

When your civic motto is, “we can’t,” it makes perfect sense for common councilmen to write an unenforceable, perhaps unconstitutional law, then for all to obliviously sit tight for as long as it takes for an enterprising individual or company to learn that it’s little more than shadow puppetry, and to violate it with impunity.

To do otherwise would come dangerously close to the quality widely known as “pro-active,” which was banned from the city limits of the Open Air Museum at some point prior to the Civil War. The disgraced Millard Fillmore may have had some role in it ... or was that Aaron Burr?

What has yet to be explained in this latest sad episode of jaw-dropping municipal flaccidity is how the II Horseshoes case came to land atop the city attorney’s desk in the first place.

Understanding that no one wants to make this point aloud, but persisting in the belief that transparency in the best policy in the arena of governance -- especially coming from an administration that the author supports -- permit me to note that until this chronology is explicated, there remains the appearance that the longtime friendship and political alliance between Mayor England and the club’s ownership had something to do with the ordinance’s vetting prior to any effort at compliance.

There’s probably nothing to it, right? But for the sake of honesty and communication, wouldn’t it be better to acknowledge the awkward nature of the situation, and aggressively head off the criticism rather than permit blogs and the local newspaper to expose it for you?

Pro-active. Transparent. Communicative.

Is it really something in the water hereabouts that suppresses the gag reflex at times like this?

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Previously at NAC:

Did he do it? Can they do it? Do it to us one more time?

Live adult entertainment ordinance: The words stir passions, but is foreplay enough?

Council approves budget with little fanfare and no live adult entertainment.

The Highwayman attended last evening’s city council meeting and files this report. He begins by addressing a point referenced previously by the senior editor: Did he do it? Can they do it? Do it to us one more time?

Also from Thursday: Live adult entertainment ordinance: The words stir passions, but is foreplay enough?

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Sad to say Dan Coffey said nary a word about this issue between gavels. However, I approached him prior to the meeting to confirm that such (a live adult entertainment ordinance) had been passed in 2001.

He replied in the affirmative, and I went on to inform him that rather than being enforced, it is firmly ensconced on the city attorney's desk awaiting a rewrite.

At that he shook his head and sighed.

As luck would have it, (city attorney) Shane Gibson was present, so I approached him to inquire as to the why's & wherefore's.

He responded that on review of the ordinance, it had been determined that in part, the fee schedule would not hold up in court, a conclusion based on similar attempts by surrounding communities that had previously failed to pass muster.

I passed that information along to CM Coffey after the meeting. His response was that it isn't the administration’s shot to call. Enforcement should be attempted, and if it fails, the council would then address it!

As for the rest of the meeting, the Mayor (oops! -- I mean Deputy Mayor) Malysz reported that based in part on the work of the council's committee on housing, the administration has a (another) plan in the works to deal with code enforcement.

He further stated that this plan would be revealed in the near future by Mayor England. No further details were offered.

Following that, the council buzzed right through the "Floyd County All Hazards Mitigation Plan", a variety of annexation & tax abatement resolutions and the Tourism Fund Revenue Bond.

Then came the real entertainment for the evening: Final passage of the 2009 budget.

There were three separate ordinances pertaining to 2009 salaries for various departments. Prior to the vote, all three of them were amended to reflect further cuts in dollars even though all departments had met the trimming request of the council since the last meeting.

After the amendments were passed 8-0, CM's Price and Zurschmiede still voted “no” on the final version. I suppose the cuts still weren't deep enough to satisfy them.

The one that still boggles the mind, however, is how the $6,800 that was trimmed from the city clerk’s budget ended up being added to the common council’s budget. The explanation I got from city controller Kay Garry was that the council had already trimmed $20,000 from their bottom line and needed the boost. I ain't buying it, but there it is.

It should be noted that the 5th District councilwoman was not present.

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Editor's note: Courier-Journal coverage is here: New Albany council approves budget. For the record, the C-J records CM Price voting in favor of the budget.

Did he do it? Can they do it? Do it to us one more time?

Our informants have said that at a recent meeting to discuss progress toward the city’s master plan for riverfront development, 1st district councilman Dan Coffey informed those assembled that a new adult-oriented business had commenced operation in New Albany.

Tonight’s city council meeting began a few minutes ago, and obviously, I’m not in attendance. Since I have a hunch that Coffey will choose public official communication time tonight to reveal this factoid to the general public, I thought it would be courteous to allow him unfettered grandstanding time, which is why I’m waiting until now to note that the business in question appears to be located at the former Rustic Frog property by the river, just within the city limits west of the center.

It’s now called 2 Horseshoes (groan), and is being touted by its backers as a “gentleman’s club.” Based on the testimony passed on to me, it appears to fall well within the regulatory boundaries of the 7-year-old adult entertainment ordinance discussed earlier today in this space.

Live adult entertainment ordinance: The words stir passions, but is foreplay enough?

Whether any of this ultimately matters has yet to be determined. It appears that the ordinance itself is undergoing scrutiny by the city attorney – at this late date, all these years after it was written into law.

Don't get me wrong. I personally haven’t the slightest interest in business models like a pole dancing emporium, primarily because I know that tackiness is an intrinsic American phenomenon, and as such, incapable of being eradicated. Suckers are born every minute, and so are morons. But, to me, it’s just another example of the city’s own laws being selectively enforced, and to the detriment of efforts to pull this backwater out of the Dark Ages.

Just once, it would be nice to be proven wrong on this point.

Alas, we haven’t been. Perhaps ROCK can arrange a Biblical flood to achieve what mere mortals apparently cannot. Until then, hypocrisy remains the order of the day in NA.

Live adult entertainment ordinance: The words stir passions, but is foreplay enough?

Searching through the pages the other day, I was surprised to learn that the city of New Albany’s Code of Ordinances includes a very lengthy and exhaustive section dating from the year 2001 that defines “live” adult entertainment businesses.

It is fascinating reading, and details a licensing procedure for such “live adult” businesses and those employed therein, mandates the establishment of a 7-member Adult Entertainment Commission (AEC), creates an adult entertainment enforcement officer, and compiles a plethora of fines and penalties for non-compliance.

It’s far too much material to reprint here, but you can peruse if online for your amusement and edification here: CHAPTER 120: LIVE ADULT ENTERTAINMENT BUSINESSES.

My first thought upon stumbling across this incredibly precise legislative document was to immediately withdraw my twice yearly pleas for City Hall to resuscitate the moribund Human Rights Commission. Frankly, a gig with the Adult Entertainment Commission strikes me as far more educational, so gimme a seat, please. I promise to bring popcorn and suitable "adult" refreshments, and to bravely refuse all offers of bribes from the Mafia.

After all, without personal integrity, how might a commission member expect to correctly gauge the merits of matters like, “Any live performance that, taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value”?

At least there’s no current reason to consider the non-enforcement of a live adult entertainment ordinance … right?

If there were, the first place to look would be the office of the Building Commissioner, where budding adult entertainment entrepreneurs are required by the city’s ordinance to file licensing paperwork and pay fees. Note that an individual can serve as licensed owner, licensed operator or licensed entertainer, but not two or even three at the same time. One job description to a person, sayeth the ordinance.

Note also that approval of the licensing for all these legally defined entities, which is an expensive undertaking requiring much cash in escrow prior to fees being collected, lies in the hands of the AEC, which is handed sufficient power to request further information and carefully vet aspiring applicants.

In short, installing a pole or two, buying a few dozen g-strings and a gross of pasties, and putting in a moist towelette dispenser don’t quite combine to feed the bulldog when it comes to adhering to the regulations written by the city council seven years ago.

The only question in this, as in other issues of ordinance enforcement, is whether the concept of obeying is uniform or selective. Is the live adult entertainment ordinance alive? Or, like so many other well-intended statutes on the city’s rule books, does it remain as lifeless as Generalissimo Francisco Franco?

If you’ll excuse me, I‘m off to do some research. Updates follow.

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10:53 a.m. update: According to intrepid NAC reporter Gordy Gant, it would seem that in a startlingly pro-active turn, the adult entertainment ordinance signposted above already lies on city attorney Shane Gibson's desk for review owing to concerns raised over its constitutionality. Ironic, to say the least, but research continues, so stay tuned.