A. In the development and adoption of this chapter, it is recognized that there are some adult business uses which have serious objectionable operational characteristics particularly when located in close proximity to residential neighborhoods, public parks, churches, public buildings, schools and other facilities, thereby having a deleterious impact upon property values and that such businesses frequently become places of criminality.
B. It has been acknowledged by communities across the nation that state and local governmental entities have a special concern in regulating the operation of such businesses under their jurisdiction to ensure those controls and regulations necessary to preserve the integrity and character of residential neighborhoods, the stability of property values, and impose restrictions and regulations upon those activities that would adversely affect property values, increase crime and violence, and prevent adverse secondary effects that will contribute to the blighting or downgrading of adjacent neighborhoods. It is the further purpose of this chapter to protect the well-being of the youth of the community from objectionable operational characteristics of these adult uses by regulating and restricting their close proximity to certain established facilities such as, but not limited to, churches, parks, schools and residential areas.
C. In recognition of the protections afforded to the citizens under the first and fourteenth amendments, it is not the intent of this chapter to inhibit freedom of speech or the press. It is further the belief that just as advertising is designed to stimulate one's appetite for desiring goods or services, an overabundance or preoccupation with sexual displays or materials arouses the appetites of those so preoccupied and encourages violations of the criminal statutes involving sexual offenses and is contrary to the health and safety of the community.
D. The provisions of this chapter have neither the purpose nor effect of imposing a limitation or restriction on the content of any communicative materials, including sexually oriented materials. Similarly, it is not the intent nor effect of this chapter to restrict or deny access by adults to sexually oriented materials protected by the first amendment, or to deny access by the distributors and exhibitors of sexually oriented entertainment to their intended market. This chapter represents a balancing of the legitimate ends of the community by imposing an incidental, content neutral place, time and manner regulation of sexually oriented businesses, without limiting alternative avenues of communication, and at the same time, requiring the business to carry its share of financing law enforcement activities. The special regulations deemed necessary to control the undesirable externalities arising from these enterprises are set forth herein. (1983 Code § 5.24.020)