TURN UP THE VOLUME! YOU DON'T WANT TO MISS THIS!

A number of times during recent Town Board meetings, certain of its members have referenced that Castle Rock Township has Commercial/Industrial (C/I) zoning, implying that this would be a good thing for our township to have, too.

Castle Rock's Ordinances pp. 35-37 and 94-108 address these uses.  See Castle Rock ordinances here.

Pages 35-37 outline these uses including a Conditional Use for adult establishments. Pages 94-108 give the regulations for Sexually-Oriented Business.

Since a township may not  be able to prohibit sexually oriented businesses once it has allowed C/I uses, the best it can do is to make such use a Conditional Use and subject to regulations and licensing.

Township Attorney Chad Lemmons has publicly stated the difficulty to prohibit these uses. These uses are constitutionally protected under freedom of expression or speech. (See emphasized portion of "Conclusions of the Town Board" below.) When this was raised, Butch Hansen characterized it as an overreaction that Eureka would have such "adult" businesses. What he doesn't seem to grasp is that once the Ordinances contain this use (which may happen if we allow C/I), the Township cannot stop a sexually oriented business here. Yes, it can be a Conditional Use, but those usually cannot be denied if the applicant agrees to any and all reasonable, related and roughly proportional conditions relative to the possible negative impacts. A Conditional Use is one allowed under the law of the community. Granting or denying one is a quasi-judicial decision, not a legislative decision in which the courts would likely give more latitude. (An public entity generally can pass the laws it wants to live under.) Court history shows the tendency to back up legislative decisions. Quasi-judicial decisions, however, are frequently litigated, and Eureka would have to obey its own Ordinances. This puts us in a conundrum.

Castle Rock Ordinance Excerpts:

6.07 C/I Commercial/Industrial District
(p. 37)
H. Conditional Uses. Adult establishments, subject to the regulations as set forth elsewhere herein and any conditions set under the conditional use permit. No adult establishment may be located within 1,000 feet of another adult establishment, a residential use, a day care provider, an on- or off-sale liquor establishment, a park or public facility. No two (2) adult establishments shall be located in the same building.

 and

7.18 Sexually-Oriented Business.
(p. 95)
C. Conclusions of the Town Board. In direct furtherance of the substantial goals of public health, safety, and welfare, the Town Board adopts the following licensing regulations, recognizing that it has a great interest in the promotion of health and the prevention of criminal activity. It is not the intent of this Section to inhibit the freedom of speech component of sexually-oriented businesses; instead, this Section represents a balancing of competing interests: reduced criminal activity through the regulation of sexually-oriented businesses versus the protected rights of participants in sexually-oriented businesses and their patrons. Thus, this Section is designed to alleviate undesirable social problems that accompany sexually-oriented businesses without curtailing the constitutionally protected expression. (Emphasis mine.)

Not putting the content here, but you might check out D. Definitions, # 25 and #26 on pages 99 and 100. This is what we could be dealing with. I'd rather pass!

Empire Township has similar Ordinance language as it also allows C/I uses and includes sexually oriented uses (Ordinance 260). It may be of note to you that each of these townships, Castle Rock and Empire, have residential zoning districts and are not completely zoned agricultural as Eureka is. The Metropolitan Council representatives have repeatedly stated that it sees Eureka as agricultural until 2040 at the earliest, with sewer and water not allowed until possibly then as well.

REMINDER that there is an Open House on considering C/I zoning to be held at Town Hall on July 9th, starting at 7:00 p.m. YOU MAY BE INTERESTED IN ATTENDING...