Local Regulation of Adult Business: Secondary Effects Evidence Under Attack

CD of a Live 90-Minute Telephone Conference with an Interactive Q&A Session Conducted on Tuesday, March 28, 2006

For years, local communities have relied upon evidence of adverse "secondary effects" to justify their adult business ordinances. But the evidentiary burden was a lenient one, with municipalities often citing evidence and studies that had been used by other jurisdictions.

The federal district court's decision in Daytona Grand, Inc. v. City of Daytona Beach, Florida, calls that practice into serious question.

Listen to our live teleconference from your office telephone as our panel of local government and adult business law specialists discuss the potential after-effects of Daytona Grand and offer practical guidance on how to draft and defend your adult business ordinances.

They addressed these and other key questions:

• What should cities do to meet the new "methodological" attacks on secondary effects studies?
• How have different courts viewed "anecdotal evidence and opinions"?
• What should cities do to meet attacks on the "sufficiency" of potential sites for adult businesses?
• How can a city insure it has "enough" sites for adult businesses?

Our panel included:

Scott D. Bergthold, Law Office of Scott D. Bergthold, Chattanooga, is a frequent lecturer for state municipal leagues and the International Municipal Lawyers Association. His national municipal law practice focuses on the drafting and defense of adult business regulations in state and federal courts. He has co-authored two books addressing adult business regulation, as well as articles for ABA State and Local Law News, Land Use Law & Zoning Digest, and Municipal Lawyer. He served as legal brief writer for the city in City of Littleton v. Z.J. Gifts D-4, LLC, 554 U.S. 774 (2204).

Mary McNeill, Morality in Media, Inc., New York, has written several municipal law treatises and counseled municipal governments and legislators on sexually oriented business regulation. She has lectured on obscenity law at Columbia Law School, and has been interviewed by the media on municipal law issues. She has authored amicus curiae briefs in First Amendment media law cases for the Third District and U.S. Supreme Court. As Director of the company's Municipal Law Project, she counsels attorneys, municipalities, and concerned citizens on municipal law, zoning law, and sexually oriented business law.

Alan C. Weinstein, Professor of Law & Urban Studies, Cleveland State University, is a nationally recognized expert on land use planning and law, lecturing frequently at planning and law conferences, and has published over fifty books, treatise chapters, and journal articles. He serves, or has served, as: Co-Chair and Chair of the Subcommittee on Land Use & the First Amendment in the American Bar Association's Section of State & Local Government Law, Chair of the Planning & Law Division of the American Planning Association (APA), Reporter for APA's Planning & Environmental Law, and member of the Board of Trustees of the Ohio Planning Conference, the state's chapter of the APA. His article Responding to the Adult Industry's Claim About No Secondary Effects was published in the September/October 2005 edition of Municipal Lawyer.

*******************************************************************************

TELECONFERENCE CD
Purchase a CD-ROM of the full conference proceedings (available three weeks after the program).