Who controls the laws?
Monday, May 4th, 1998Well, it seems that lately, one of the main topics of discussion is back to that subject I wrote about over a year ago: BYOB. Why is it such a hot topic? Well, because several clubs: Lil’ Darlings, Club Exotica, Talk of The Town along with two other clubs have all gotten fined $50,000 each for license violations because of BYOB.
Why such a stiff penalty, and why aren’t other nude clubs getting fined for the same thing? Well, simple. Some clubs are located in the city of Las Vegas, while others are located on unincorporated land in Clark County. The two fall under different jurisdictions and have different sets of rules.
Under title 6.35.100 of the Las Vegas city code, nude clubs are not allowed to sell or allow alcohol on the premises. Even though the city has been fairly relaxed in enforcement in the past, the last few months has seen a steady increase in pressure for the nude clubs to actually obey the laws. Gone are the days of bringing in a 12 pack of beer in a brown bag.
Now why are they choosing to enforce the laws now? Well, Las Vegas is broken up into 4 wards which all have a council member representing it, who ultimately reports to the mayor. This, of course, is for incorporated Las Vegas, also referred to as ‘city’. In politics, there is always an agenda to every action. All we can assume is that someone else is most likely benefitting from the selective enforcement of the law in these clubs. Could it be the alcohol clubs? Maybe. Could it be a new moral contingent trying to make Las Vegas into Park Disney? Maybe. But the fact remains; enforcement against the strip clubs within the city limits are indeed getting tougher.
For areas which fall outside of the city parameters, which can actually be certain areas of land actually running inside the cities, it is also known as unincorporated land or ‘county’. At this point, the county has not been very tough on the nude clubs, however, as the political and social climate changes in the town we know as Las Vegas, you can be sure that enforcement can happen at any time.