Thursday, July 14, 2005
Editorial: Finding a proper place for porn
From the RoundTable blog
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Roanoke County would prefer to ban them outright, but since that is not a constitutionally acceptable alternative, it needs to craft ordinances that would prevent a strip club from opening next to a middle school. Roanoke County supervisors should be encouraged to pursue discussions started this week that begin the tedious process of adopting control ordinances. The county does not expect any adult business to open shop anytime soon, but good planning requires anticipating demand rather than reacting to the unexpected.
Without laws governing where such businesses go, Roanoke County is stripped of its power to respond to church groups or neighborhoods worried about miscreants and lowered property values.
Ordinances designating zones for adult businesses aren't simply feel-good laws, as one supervisor suggested. Nor is Roanoke County immune from the seedier slice of life, as another supervisor implied in stereotyping residents as middle class, family oriented and therefore not interested in supporting adult fare. Pornography wouldn't be the booming business it is without support from the middle class.
Supervisors discussed relegating adult businesses to commercial areas, where the public should find them least offensive. And they propose requiring a 100-foot buffer zone. That distance seems extremely narrow to place between adult toys and day-care centers.
Roanoke County instead might want to look at ordinances in neighboring municipalities, such as Roanoke and Blacksburg, which both require 500 feet between adult businesses and day care centers, schools and churches.
By having waited this long to address the placement of adult businesses, Roanoke County enjoys the added benefit of being able to pattern its ordinances after ones that have withstood court challenges.
