Report Inappropriate Comments

The COUNTY code, not just Port Townsend muni code, also restricts and requires licensing of S.O.B. (sexually oriented businesses).

Have the required permits been obtained?

Not opposed to this business, just recalling that the county commissioners spent several of their meetings debating this issue.

---------------------------

JCC Chapter 18.10 DEFINITIONS

“Sexually oriented business” means:

(1) Any exhibition, performance or dance conducted in an sexually oriented business facility where such exhibition, performance or dance is distinguished or characterized by a predominant emphasis on matters depicting, describing, or simulating any specified sexual activities or any specified anatomical areas; or

(2) Any exhibition, performance or dance intended to sexually stimulate any patron and conducted in a sexually oriented business facility where such exhibition, performance or dance is performed for, arranged with, or engaged in with fewer than all patrons in the sexually oriented business facility at that time, with separate consideration paid, either directly or indirectly, for such performance, exhibition or dance. For purposes of example and not limitation, such exhibitions, performances or dances are commonly referred to as table dancing, couch dancing, taxi dancing, lap dancing, private dancing or straddle dancing; or

(3) Sexually oriented retail store, meaning an enclosed building, or any portion thereof, which, for money or any other form of consideration, devotes a significant or substantial portion of stock in trade to the sale, exchange, rental, loan, trade, transfer or viewing of sexually oriented materials. For purposes of this definition, a retail store devotes a significant or substantial portion of its stock in trade to sexually oriented materials if the sale, exchange, rental, loan, trade, transfer or viewing of such sexually oriented materials is clearly material to the economic viability of the business. It is rebuttably presumed that such sexually oriented materials are clearly material to the viability of the business if sexually oriented materials account for:

(a) Twenty-five percent or more of the retail dollar value of gross sales over any quarterly period;

(b) Twenty-five percent or more of the floor area of the store open to the public;

(c) Twenty-five percent or more of the retail dollar value of all merchandise displayed in the store;

(d) Twenty-five percent or more of the store’s inventory (whether measured by retail dollar value or number of items); or

(e) Twenty-five percent or more of the store’s stock in trade.

In no event shall a retailer whose transactions only incidentally or marginally relate to sexually oriented materials be considered a sexually oriented retail store.

JCC Chapter 5.10

LICENSING AND OPERATION OF SEXUALLY ORIENTED BUSINESS FACILITIES

...