Renton Weighs Establishing An X-Rated Zone

RENTON

The city of Renton, which made legal history in its crusade against an operator of X-rated theaters in 1986, is now giving the cold shoulder to adult video and novelty stores.

A proposed ordinance would force "adult retail" businesses out of neighborhoods and into an industrial district south of Interstate 405. The City Council will begin discussing it Monday night.

Other cities also are studying how to respond to the proliferation of sexually oriented shops.

Renton's latest anti-porn fight began two years ago, when a video store called Adults Only opened near an elementary school in the Renton Highlands, a residential neighborhood east of downtown. Residents have picketed the store.

The city's response to such establishments is basically the same strategy it used in the early 1980s against Roger Forbes, who owned X-rated movie houses across the state.

In 1982, Forbes bought the downtown Renton and Roxy theaters, intending to show adult films. But city codes already limited adult theaters to the industrial zone. The dispute cost each side $1 million and reached the U.S. Supreme Court in 1986. In Renton vs. Playtime Theatres, justices ruled 7-2 that the city's law was constitutional. Forbes never did show adult movies there.

The court upheld Renton's adult-theater zoning because, it said, its main purpose wasn't to suppress free-speech rights but to control secondary effects such as crime and reduced property values.

The ruling still dominates the national debate on X-rated businesses; New York City relied on Renton's case in its 1995 zoning rule to rid Times Square of sex businesses.

Recently, adult retail shops have been going mainstream, with upscale marketing and decor. Auburn-based Lovers Package operates 15 stores in the Puget Sound area and four in Arizona. Phoenix-based Castle Superstores recently opened outlets in Tacoma, Spokane, Kennewick and Silverdale, Kitsap County, and has bought a site in Federal Way.

Castle's Federal Way purchase prompted a moratorium on new sex shops last year, and the city is considering whether to force all X-rated establishments into the central business area, where only two of six such businesses are now.

Although many cities regulate nude-dance clubs and theaters, book and video clubs usually don't have the same limitations. Cities around the state are watching to see how the Renton case turns out.

Kent employs a 20 percent rule, saying that any business selling that proportion of X-rated inventory must keep 1,000 feet from schools, churches, libraries, homes and parks.

Under Renton's proposal, adult retail businesses would have one year to move or get an extension from the city. Mayor Jesse Tanner says three that might be affected are Adults Only, Dan's Adult Video Variety, near the freeway, and Lovers Package, on Rainier Avenue South.

Adults Only is a brightly lit store, with frosted windows that prevent peeking from outside. The store carries mainly videotapes and magazines, as well as lingerie, toys, cigars and bongs. Almost 2,000 customers are registered to rent films there, says owner Ronald Harbin.

Renton's file on adult entertainment contains just one negative report on Adults Only: During a protest there last July, two 12-year-old boys found a cassette and wrappings with explicit photos.

In some cities, however, X-rated businesses have been magnets for prostitution, robberies and other crime. In its 1986 case, Renton relied on problems that Seattle had with adult theaters to justify its zoning law.

City Attorney Warren says that to wait until Renton has severe problems with sex shops defeats the purpose of the zoning. It would be like waiting for someone to be killed before passing a law against murder, he says.

Harbin says he'll sue if Renton tries to drive him out.

"This is still America, in spite of what some people think," he said. "They have to prove I've done something wrong."

He draws a distinction between theaters, peep shows or nude-dancing clubs, where the entertainment occurs on site, and his store, where people buy things to use in the privacy of their own homes.

So does Castle's chief executive officer, Taylor Coleman.

"You can't treat me any differently because you don't like what I sell," he said.

In 1991, the state Supreme Court ruled in favor of an adult-video store and against the city of Tukwila, finding that the city lacked proof that a retail store caused the negative secondary effects associated with on-site adult entertainment.

City Councilwoman Kathy Keolker-Wheeler predicts that the city's growing population will lead to more disputes over perceived commercial threats to neighborhoods.

"As we get closer together," she said, "I think people get more concerned over their little space of the world. They want to protect and defend that."