City initiates measure to regulate nude dancing

WESTBROOK – Westbrook city officials took an initial step Wednesday toward creating an ordinance regulating nude dancing in the city.

If approved, city officials say, the regulations would apply to Dreamers Cabaret, a new strip club that opened on Warren Avenue last week. City officials say they were not informed beforehand that the business involved nude dancing. The city quickly shut the club down, citing code violations.

The proposed nude entertainment ordinance would limit businesses offering such dancing to the industrial zone at least 500 feet from homes, schools and churches. Other provisions in the ordinance include a ban on the sale or consumption of alcohol on the premises of such businesses, and requiring that the dancers cover their genital areas.

In a special meeting early Wednesday morning, the City Council voted to send the proposed nude entertainment ordinance to the Committee of the Whole. If the ordinance is adopted by the City Council, it has a provision in it that says it would be retroactive to Wednesday, Sept. 22, when the council first took some action on it.

Bill Dale, the city’s attorney, says that means the new regulations would apply to Dreamers Cabaret, which opened in a former warehouse at 84B Warren Avenue on Friday, Sept. 17. The next day, the city shut down the club, saying it didn’t meet fire codes and conditions of its occupancy permit.

However, The Ferrante Group, which owns the business, on Tuesday applied for city permits to re-open.

And the attorney representing Dreamers Cabaret has contended that the city only closed the business because officials belatedly realized the city does not have any ordinance that regulates such adult entertainment facilities in Westbrook.

“Read between the lines,” attorney Thomas Hallett of Portland said earlier this week. “What happened is they came in and shut these guys down because they don’t like that they have a zoning error.”

Dale said that Dreamers Cabaret would be subject to the regulations in the new ordinance and not have grandfathered rights.

“If you’re not lawfully in operation and then a new government regulation gets enacted, you don’t get protected,” Dale said.

The city contends that Dreamers Cabaret was not legal when it opened last Friday.

City Administrator Jerre Bryant has said city officials became aware late Friday of its existence, and closed it down on Saturday because of fire code violations. Parts of the building did not have a sprinkler system, and its fire alarm system was inadequate, Bryant said.

Then, on Monday, the city also yanked the business’ occupancy permit, after determining that additional construction work on the building took place after the permit was issued, Bryant said.

But Hallett that day characterized the alleged violations as minor, and said the club planned to address them and reopen very quickly.

For example, Hallett said, only one sprinkler head was missing and he said the owner has a contract to install the fire alarm that fire officials have specified they want, one that flashes a strobe light in addition to having an audible alarm.

Hallett said that when the business owner previously showed the city the contract to have the fire alarm installed within 30 days, the city issued the business an occupancy permit on that basis. The city’s code enforcement officer signed the permit on Sept. 10, according to the city.

Also, Hallett said, the only construction that took place after the occupancy permit was issued was the building of a small wall to hide an electrical panel.

According to Bryant, the club’s owner represented to the city that the business would be an arcade/billiards hall.

Lawrence Ferrante of Westbrook, the person to whom the occupancy permit was issued, on Monday denied having said that. Ferrante declined to comment further, referring questions to Hallett.

Hallett contends that the club is legal in that industrial zone site on Warren Avenue. Private indoor recreational facilities are permitted in that zone. Hallett said Dreamers Cabaret meets the definition of a private recreational facility because it will have weightlifting and other sports-related activities over time.

But, Bryant has said that the city has to make a determination whether an adult entertainment facility fits under that definition. At the special 7:30 a.m. City Council meeting on Wednesday, which Mayor Colleen Hilton called the day before and which lasted only four minutes, Bryant said the council also approved a request to the Planning Board asking it to further clarify the zoning ordinance, explaining more clearly what is meant by a private recreational facility.

That clarification, which the council would have to adopt as an amendment to the zoning ordinance, also would be retroactive to Sept. 22, Bryant said.

The Committee of the Whole, which is made up of city councilors, is expected to consider the nude entertainment ordinance proposal at some point next month.

Hallett has said that nude dancing is a form of free speech protected under the First Amendment and that municipalities can’t outlaw such an activity, but can regulate where in a community such businesses can be located.

Dale said that the ordinance that Westbrook is proposing would impose limits on nude dancing but would not prohibit it. The Maine Supreme Judicial Court has already determined such limitations are legal, in a 2003 case brought by the city of Bangor against a nude dancing establishment there called Diva’s, Dale said.

Bryant said that the city administration about a year ago began drafting such an ordinance at the request of former Mayor Bruce Chuluda. Bryant said the city had been contacted by a business owner who wanted to open an adult entertainment business in Westbrook. However, Bryant said, the business owner decided to look outside the city, so the plan to develop some regulations never reached the level of the City Council.

The current draft ordinance states a variety of reasons why the city of Westbrook would want to regulate nude dancing establishments.

The document says that the reasons include that “other communities have determined that nude entertainment can induce individuals to engage in prostitution, sexual assaults, breaches of the peace and other criminal activity.”

Also, the draft ordinance says, “nude entertainment is patently offensive to a majority of the residents of Westbrook,” and can have negative, “tawdry” impacts on surrounding neighborhoods.

The proposed ordinance includes a variety of limitations on nude entertainment establishments. Among them is one stating that nude dancing businesses can only be located in the industrial zone and away from homes, schools, churches, parks, playgrounds and other such public gathering places.

The Warren Avenue site of Dreamers Cabaret is not near schools, Bryant said. But, he said, the city hasn’t examined whether it would be within 500 feet of other places listed in the ordinance.

Hallett said Dreamers Cabaret site in a good one in because it’s away from residences.

“It’s a perfect location,” he said. “It’s not going to bother anyone, anywhere, anytime.”

Dreamers Cabaret does not have a city liquor license, but Bryant said the city had heard that the business wants to be a so-called “bottle club,” where patrons could bring their own liquor. However, the proposed ordinance also would prohibit the sale or consumption of alcohol on the site of a nude dancing establishment.

Among other provisions of the proposed ordinance is a requirement that a business owner state in an application for use permit to the city that nude dancing will be involved. Also, all principals of such a business must give their names and residences on the application, and police will do a criminal background check on each.

In the case of Dreamers Cabaret, Hallett would only say that the owner is The Ferrante Group.

However, the city has said that Lawrence Ferrante, who goes by Larry, filled out the application.

Ferrante is listed on his Facebook page as a college history major turned electrician.

His page says he grew up in Avon, Mass., but now lives in Westbrook and is president of LPF Electric Co. Inc. of Westbrook.

He served in the U.S. Army, and then studied electronics at Southern Maine Vocational Technical Institute (now Southern Maine Community College) in South Portland in 1984. He next earned a bachelor’s degree in history from the University of Southern Maine in 1993 and then a master’s of science degree in history from Columbia University in 1997.

At LPF Electric Co. truck was outside 84B Warren Ave. on Wednesday morning. According to a workman who came out of the building, the business owner declined to comment to a reporter.

Dreamers Cabaret, a new strip club that opened on Warren Avenue last week, was quickly shut down by Westbrook officials. Now, city councilors will consider an ordinance regulating nude dancing in the city. Staff photo by Tess Nacelewicz