P&Z listens to counsel, application is unanimous.

The P&Z last night unanimously approved the application to remove the special permit requirement for adult uses in the I-3 zones on recommendation from their legal council.

This means two things. First, they have removed one very clear unconstitutional problem from the Masters Club law suit which they were certain to lose on in court. Second, adult businesses can now locate by right in I-3 zones.

I have to give it to the members of P&Z. I would not have had the cajones to take the gamble that between the end of the moratorium and whenever they can change the adult zone layouts (if that’s even on the radar) from all of I-3 to something a bit more constrained and less infectious nobody is going to apply to open a club or other adult business in one of the many I-3 zones. It also seems there is an expectation that the council’s ordinances are going to dissuade businesses who might otherwise come to town from doing so. That’s not a view I share. While a nuisance, the ordinances are wholly manageable and those parts which aren’t will be challenged in court in short order.

P&Z members who voted against N. Meadows/Prestige Park and in favor of last nights application declined to comment on any specific reason for their decision.

I’ll think about it a little more, maybe I’ll come around. Or not. Video to follow. It’s gonna take awhile at over 2 hours in length.

What I can’t seem to get my head around is that all chances of fixing our regs before the lawsuits move forward and the moratorium expires is now gone. The administration has squandered 8 months and only put two plans before the P&Z which were both bad at best. Some of the blame sits with the P&Z for this too. Granted they were listening to their legal counsel and the Mayor et al., but when they saw that they weren’t getting straight answers or constructive plans which meet all the requirements for a constitutional adult zone they had an obligation to make their own plans and start their own discussions. I’ll give them a pass on this because apparently that’s not how things are done in this town, but in the future let this serve as evidence that this is how things MUST be done in town, they’ll happen no other way.

By now you’ve read or heard my plan for a Roberts St zone. If not it’s in the video. It seems obvious that the reason a plan like this, despite having the least secondary impact for our neighborhoods, wasn’t considered is because it effectively would have given Masters Club what they wanted. I can’t help but believe that had Masters Club bought property in Prestige Park instead we’d have seen an adult zone created on Roberts St already and the I-3 wouldn’t be an option from the town’s perspective.