Same nudity ordinance on city agenda

BANGOR — There’s a reason that Monday’s eight-page ordinance on toplessness looks so much like the one the City Council considered two weeks ago. It’s the same measure. A vote is scheduled for the 7:30 p.m. meeting at City Hall, but it probably will be tabled.

Diva’s attorney Wayne Foote said last week he would be unable to attend the meeting, and Councilor Michael Crowley said Saturday that he expected the ordinance to be tabled until the next meeting.

Two weeks ago, the ordinance designed to regulate exotic dance businesses was referred back to the municipal operations committee after some of the councilors said it was obvious what the citizenry really wanted was a ban on public nudity.

Last Tuesday, the committee decided it would be best to proceed with the proposed ordinance so it could be implemented, then to work on the ban separately.

The ordinance, which would allow toplessness but not full nudity, would contain several regulations, among them restricting businesses offering commercial nudity to certain commercial zones in the city, prohibiting tipping and touching of the performers by patrons and requiring documentation to ensure that none of the dancers was under 18.

Even if they abided by all of the other requirements, Diva’s and Deb’s — the two exotic dance businesses now open — would be in violation of the location requirements. The proposed ordinance would grandfather existing establishments in their current location for one year and allow for a possible one-year extension.

Diva’s owner Diane Cormier and her attorney have asked that the council consider at least a five-year grandfather period so Cormier could recoup her investment of “a quarter of a million dollars.”

Wayne Foote has given the council a document itemizing the $243,704 in start-up costs, with one of the major expenses being $64,800 of Cormier’s labor costs to get the building ready — $30 an hour for eight hours a day, seven days a week for nine months.

Other large expenses listed include rent of $1,850 a month to building owner David Lawler, for a total of $66,600 over three years; $20,000 for a security system; $17,000 for a three-year advertising contract with NYNEX; $10,000 for creation and maintenance of an Internet Web site.

The many other items listed range from paint and carpeting to two massage tables, black lights, neon signs, televisions, a cash register and four couches. Costs for Cormier’s apartment in the building are not included.

City Solicitor Erik Stumpfel questions the numbers claimed in the list, including the value of Cormier’s time in readying the building for the business.

He also noted in an April 27 memo to the City Council, “The large majority of items consist of movable personal property that could presumably be relocated to a new location with more or less difficulty.” He added that if any of the items were used at Cormier’s previous locations in Ellsworth and Exeter, for example, it may be that some of those have fully depreciated.

Stumpfel also pointed out that the business had recouped part of the investment in the months it has been open and would recoup more during a 12-month grandfather period.

Taking that into account, he estimated that her unrecoverable costs would be in the range of $30,000 to $45,000 and calculated that Cormier should be able to recoup that in the 1 1/2 years or so she would have been in business at the site at the end of the one-year grandfather period.

“In her most recent testimony to the municipal operations committee on April 21,” Stumpfel wrote, “Ms. Cormier stated that she has 1,200-1,500 customers per month, each paying a $10 cover charge. The math works out to revenues of $144,000 to $180,000, not including beverage sales and revenues from the exotic dance school portion of the business.”

Still unresolved is the council’s denial of Cormier’s request for a liquor license for DMC Lounge, planned for a separate section of the State Street building. The lounge will have its entrance on French Street, near the current entrance to Diva’s.

Cormier has appealed the denial to the Bureau of Alcoholic Beverages in Augusta and a state hearing was to have been held Tuesday at City Hall. Stumpfel said Friday that the state has postponed the hearing to 10:30 a.m. Thursday, June 4.