Strip-club moratorium raises charge of monopoly

By Jim Brunner and Bob Young
Seattle Times staff reporters

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But the longtime comedy-club operator has been stymied by the city's "temporary" moratorium on new strip joints — a restriction that has been in effect 15 years. That gives Colacurcio, who owns Rick's strip club in Lake City, and other current club owners a de facto monopoly.

Davis is weighing a legal challenge to the moratorium and recently took the first step necessary to launch a lawsuit. He formally applied for a license and was denied by the city last month.

"There's no other business in town that has no competition," Davis said.

Davis' move adds an uncomfortable wrinkle to today's Seattle City Council meeting, when its members are expected to repeat an annual rite of spring and adopt — as they have every year since 1988 — another one-year moratorium on new strip-club licenses.

At least one council member now suggests the city ought to drop the moratorium and come up with a more legally defensible way of regulating adult entertainment.

Extending the moratorium is a Band-Aid, contends Councilman Peter Steinbrueck, one that could be peeled away by a lawsuit that would cause the city significant harm.

"Why wait for a lawsuit that exposes the city to financial damages and permits (strip clubs) anywhere in the city where business is allowed?" said Steinbrueck, who stresses that he is not advocating for more strip clubs.

City Attorney Tom Carr has advised the council that the moratorium is legally questionable, according to Steinbrueck.

But publicly, Carr isn't willing to be quite as critical about a city ordinance he may have to defend in court.

"I've been concerned about extending a one-year moratorium for 15 years. I think the city's position is defensible, but I'm not happy about the moratorium," Carr said in an interview.
 
Davis said he's not sure he wants to spend the money it would take to sue the city over the matter. But he plans to attend today's council meeting to testify against the moratorium.

Testing the limits

Meanwhile, he's decided to push the city's rules on nude dancing to the limit.

Hit by slow business at his downtown Urban Comedy Cafe, Davis recently decided to ditch no-name comedians in favor of nearly nude dancers on weekend nights.

In doing so, Davis is using a little-known loophole in state and city laws: He's allowed to serve booze in his club and feature nearly nude female dancers, but the women have to remain on stage at least 6 feet from customers.

By contrast, strip clubs such as Rick's can't serve alcohol, but they can allow women to leave the stage and perform intimate "lap dances" with patrons.

Davis also must pay his dancers an hourly wage, while Rick's requires women to pay the club more than $100 per shift, which they earn back in tips.

Susan Blaker, senior agent for the state Liquor Control Board in Seattle, said Davis' setup is unusual but legal.

Seattle's ban on new strip clubs first took effect in 1988 as a 180-day "temporary" measure, spurred by residential neighborhood complaints about the opening of several new nude dance clubs. The goal then was to adopt new zoning rules that would regulate where new clubs could be located.

But over the years, city leaders found it more politically expedient to simply extend the moratorium. Each spring, the council passes a virtually identical ordinance claiming the city needs time to study a new court ruling or law related to adult entertainment.

This year's version cites an adult-entertainment moratorium in Auburn, saying Seattle needs time to study that city's experience.

That leaves just five clubs licensed in the city, including Rick's in Lake City, the Colacurcio-owned club at the center of an election controversy last year. Besides Rick's, there is Déjà Vu downtown, The Sands in the Loyal Heights neighborhood and Centerfolds in Crown Hill. A fifth club has a license to operate in Greenwood but does not currently feature dancers.

Working on rules

Carr's staff has been working on regulations that would impose stricter rules on Seattle's clubs, patterned after rules in suburban cities. In Bellevue, for example, strippers have to stay 4 feet away from customers.

But that proposal won't be ready before the council's vote today, Carr said.

Mayor Greg Nickels and Council President Jan Drago signaled they would push to simply extend the current moratorium.

Marianne Bichsel, spokeswoman for Nickels, said, "It's not the mayor's job to increase the number of strip clubs in the city. He has other priorities."

Drago said the council doesn't have time to waste debating strip-club rules.

"This council has so many big issues before us: monorail, Magnuson Park, Northgate, South Lake Union, the Families and Education Levy and a two-year budget," Drago said.

And, she added, any attempt to lift the ban and control the number of clubs through restrictive zoning would likely stir up a "hornet's nest" of protest.

"You can't put an adult-entertainment district anywhere in the city. We've been through that," she said, referring to attempts in the 1980s to designate areas where new strip clubs could open.

Drago said she expects a majority of the council to vote for the status quo.

"Absolutely. At this point the only responsible thing to do is pass the moratorium because we have no backup plan," she said.

Steinbrueck argues that it's better to plan for the future and act now. Adopting rules will only be harder next year, he said, because the mayor and four council members will be up for re-election and it's difficult to imagine them voting to end the moratorium during a campaign.

"I don't buy that baloney about workloads (preventing council action this year). We're busy as hell all the time. That's a given," he said.

Davis said the city would benefit by opening up the strip-club market to competition. He wants to open a nonsmoking "gentleman's club" starkly different from the dark and smoky Rick's.

"I don't run fleabag clubs," Davis said.

Jim Brunner: 206-515-5628 or

Bob Young: 206-464-2174