A Federal Appeals Court has upheld a lower court’s ruling that Hancock County’s permit process for adult entertainment businesses was legal, dealing a blow to local strip club operators who sued, claiming the process was flawed.
Without comment, the 5th U.S. Circuit of Appeals in New Orleans, upheld a
2005 decision by U.S. District Judge Louis Guirola Jr., who ruled for the county in the lawsuit filed filed against it by strip club developers Weldon Frommeyer and Kirk Ladner, the Sun Herald reported.
The three 5th Circuit judges who made the ruling Monday were E. Grady Jolly, William Lockhart Garwood and Carolyn Dineen King.
Hancock County has nine zoning districts that were established in 1997 as part of an ordinance which listed more than 80 ways to use land legally. But the use for strip clubs was not mentioned, meaning the county would need to make a “special exception” before issuing a building permit for any strip club proponent.
In their suit Frommeyer and Ladner said they applied for building permits under the law’s special exception provision in 2004. But they sued the county, claiming that it didn’t have specific rules regulating adult entertainment.
About four months after the applications were filed, supervisors adopted a measure regulating strip club operations and another one barring alcohol in businesses where employees are exposing certain body parts or engaging in “sexual activities.”
But even after the passage of another measure allowing adult businesses in specifically zoned areas, Frommeyer and Ladner said the new county rules made it impossible to operate a strip club.
