Atlanta residents oppose local nude dance clubs

Nation's Restaurant News, July 8, 1991 by Jack Hayes

ATLANTA -- Nude dance club operators are facing a new storm of protest as they venture outside the limits of this major Sunbelt city to bring late-night entertainment closer to the doorsteps of suburban clientele.

Battling lawmaker in several surrounding counties and municipalities, where prevailing attitudes are that nudity is one in the same with "obscenity," operators are taking to the courts to challenge hastily adopted ordinances, some of which have already been set aside as unconstitutional.

"At this point the girls at Lonesome Dove -- a club in Clayton County located south of Atlanta -- are dancing with bathing suits on," said Chris Souza, the day managet at Lonesome Dove's Atlanta sister club, the Tattletale Lounge.

Tattletale Lounge operates in Fulton County, where the only restriction on nude dance clubs is a zoning ordinance that forbids them to locate within a specified number of feet from school, church and residential properties.

But under a brand-new Clayton County ordinance, police recently rounded up naked dancers at Lonesome Dove. So the operators are living with the law until a July court hearing, at which time they expect the law to be rescinded.

"I think they'll set up a couple of guidelines similar to those in Fulton County [which houses most of the city of Atlanta]," Souza said.

Meanwhile, the Lonesome Dove and Tattletale operator has a nude dance club called Blazing Saddles in nearby DeKalb County, where a controversial ordinance was just passed banning alcohol in establishments that provide "adult entertainment."

Critics of the new DeKalb Ciunty ordinance claim it rubber stamps a 1988 law passed by the Georgia General Assembly, a law that had been ruled unconstitutional in the state's Supreme Court. DeKalb County also just passed nude dance club zoning stricter than those in Fulton County.

"DeKalb County is pretty extreme [on the zoning rule]," Souza said. "But our club there is meeting all the requirements."

Cobb County to the northwest of Atlanta also has been a place of unrest in the aftermath of recent nude dance club openings.

The city of Smyrna rushed through an ordinance attempting to shut down. The Platinum Plus, which opened as a non-alcoholic dance club similar to operations in California and Florida called "juice bars."

But a federal judge dismissed Smyrna's nude dance ordinance and said the club is allowed to remain open until 3 a.m. pending a hearing. And now Smyrna is trying to settle out of court with the operator who had originally sued the city for $7 million.

"Their tax dollars would be better spent elsewhere," said Don Gravley, who owns and operates The Platinum Plus and is negotiating for another location in Smyrna. "If they keep hasling me, I'll file an even bigger suit."