Our informants have said that at a recent meeting to discuss progress toward the city’s master plan for riverfront development, 1st district councilman Dan Coffey informed those assembled that a new adult-oriented business had commenced operation in New Albany.
Tonight’s city council meeting began a few minutes ago, and obviously, I’m not in attendance. Since I have a hunch that Coffey will choose public official communication time tonight to reveal this factoid to the general public, I thought it would be courteous to allow him unfettered grandstanding time, which is why I’m waiting until now to note that the business in question appears to be located at the former Rustic Frog property by the river, just within the city limits west of the center.
It’s now called 2 Horseshoes (groan), and is being touted by its backers as a “gentleman’s club.” Based on the testimony passed on to me, it appears to fall well within the regulatory boundaries of the 7-year-old adult entertainment ordinance discussed earlier today in this space.
Live adult entertainment ordinance: The words stir passions, but is foreplay enough?
Whether any of this ultimately matters has yet to be determined. It appears that the ordinance itself is undergoing scrutiny by the city attorney – at this late date, all these years after it was written into law.
Don’t get me wrong. I personally haven’t the slightest interest in business models like a pole dancing emporium, primarily because I know that tackiness is an intrinsic American phenomenon, and as such, incapable of being eradicated. Suckers are born every minute, and so are morons. But, to me, it’s just another example of the city’s own laws being selectively enforced, and to the detriment of efforts to pull this backwater out of the Dark Ages.
Just once, it would be nice to be proven wrong on this point.
Alas, we haven’t been. Perhaps ROCK can arrange a Biblical flood to achieve what mere mortals apparently cannot. Until then, hypocrisy remains the order of the day in NA.
