LOS ANGELES—Although it will be just a couple of months less than two years from now when Los Angeles County will be able to enforce what's left of Measure B, the mandatory condom/barrier protection ordinance passed by voters several years ago, County Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer has decided that now is the time to let the adult industry know just how much it will cost them in public health permit fees to continue to shoot hardcore content in the county. Ferrer will be presenting her proposed fee schedule to the County Board of Supervisors Tuesday morning, possibly as early as 9:30 a.m. in the County Board of Supervisors meeting room, Room 381B, at 500 West Temple Street in downtown L.A.
The fee, which would be in addition to the fee for a shooting permit from FilmLA, the agency which issues such permits, would be good for two years, and would cost a few cents less than $1,672, with a renewal fee for another two years of just over $982. In addition, the county would charge approximately $65 for a Public Health Investigator to come to an adult set and make sure the producers there were following the guidelines enacted several years ago—and if the investigator's visit to the set were after regular working hours, the charge would be about $90. And while it's unknown what situations would require that a Public Health Investigator Manager be present, that person's set visit during regular working hours would be roughly an additional $84, and if outside of those hours, $117.
According to a ruling by U.S. District Judge Dean D. Pregerson, the public health fees can be in an amount only "sufficient to provide for the cost of any necessary enforcement," and it is unclear just how the county and/or the Public Health Director came up with the figures currently being proposed. It is perhaps noteworthy that at its height, the adult industry paid for about 480 filming permits in 2012. By 2015, after Judge Pregerson upheld the constitutionality of Measure B, that number dropped to about 25, and continues to remain low, with a large portion of adult content now being shot outside Los Angeles County, and often as far away as Las Vegas.
In any case, the County Board of Supervisors must approve the fees, and they are slated to discuss and presumably give that approval on Tuesday morning, August 22, beginning at 9:30 a.m. The Free Speech Coalition, the trade organization of the adult content and pleasure products industry, is urging everyone involved in adult content production, and anyone who is in any way affected by that production, to attend the Supervisors' meeting to express their views on the proposed fees.
For more information, contact Free Speech Coalition's Communications Director Siouxsie Q at [email protected].
