Lots of folks have been asking me why I haven’t written a blog about the Strip Club Problem that seems to be the talk of North Miami and North Miami Beach recently.  Since it’s a slow news day, I figured I’d jot down a few words and throw them out there.

Let me first start out by saying that this is just my opinion.  You can agree or disagree, but there’s certainly no need to get testy.  If you have an opinion, that’s what the comment box is down there at the bottom of the page.  Opine your heart out.  Okay?

I happen to be one of those people who believe in the adage “Live and Let Live.”  I’m not concerned about your “lifestyle,” what you have pierced (unless you’re my minor child), how many tattoos you have (again, see comment about being my minor child), or what you do for a living.  As long as all of the above are legal and you’re not hurting anyone else, I do not care.  Go ahead, and hurt yourself if that’s what turns you on, but don’t bring any unwilling victims (or minor children) along for the ride, thank you very much.

That being said, however, I also have an opinion about code enforcement, including what types of businesses are more or less desirable to a city’s image.  I think we can all agree, or at least I hope we do, that a city which endeavors to be taken seriously as first class place to live, work and visit, should not be showcasing strip clubs, tattoo parlors, pawn shops, palm readers and fortune tellers, or triple x video stores.  There’s just nothing classy about those types of establishments.  I’m not saying there isn’t a need for these, um, services (Fortune tellers?  Seriously?), but I am saying that allowing them to proliferate on our most highly traveled main thoroughfare doesn’t exactly scream, “THIS IS A FABULOUS PLACE TO RAISE YOUR KIDS!”  I’m just saying.

Whoever thought it was a good idea to license not one, but two, strip clubs on Biscayne Boulevard, right in the heart of North Miami Beach, where logic tells me that upscale developments, such as fancy hotels and boutique shopping centers, would have been a welcome sight, should never have been in charge of zoning.  I’m told that city officials are not legally allowed to prevent “adult entertainment establishments” from being erected (okay, yeah, pun intended), but they can and should legislate responsible zoning laws so that these places are built far away from the public eye and off the beaten track.  NMB has a third strip club somewhere in some warehouse district “out west.”  I have no idea where it is, which is exactly my point.  I’ve never accidentally driven past it, but I’m guessing that its patrons have absolutely no trouble finding it.  This is as it should be.  In my humble opinion, of course.

Until now, North Miami has been somehow able to escape having the “dreaded strip club” within its borders.  That may be about to change, as the city council almost voted last Tuesday night to lift a ban on selling alcohol while naked.  Apparently, the owners of a strip club that left Sunny Isles Beach due to a redevelopment of the area, now want to build one in North Miami at 2050 NE 151 Street, and the No Titties or No Booze rule just won’t do.  According to the Miami Herald article, N. Miami vote of booze in strip clubs put on hold, when they operated their business in Sunny Isles Beach, “female dancers performed friction dances and participated in onstage showers with each other –– or with customers.”

I’m guessing that when Sunny Isles Beach decided to change its image from Kitschy Tourist Trap to Family Friendly City on the Atlantic, “friction dances” and “onstage showers” weren’t part of its marketing plan.  Good call.

Somehow, first class cities such as Aventura, Weston and Coral Springs, for example, don’t seem to have Strip Club Problems.  I’m not surprised.  They also have strict code enforcement.

Despite it’s blatantly corrupt mayor and its refusal to play nice with others, North Miami has made great strides in beautifying its city and bringing some much needed cultural improvements.  Which is why I’m stymied by the council’s sudden desire to blow its image by planting a strip club right in the proximity of Biscayne Landings, David Lawrence Jr. K-8 Center, Alonzo and Tracy Mourning Senior High School and Florida International University.  The site is also right next door to “the Community Television Foundation of South Florida, WPBT2” (the home of Sesame Street) and within rock throwing distance of several upscale automobile dealerships, which sell cars that cost more than my house.  I imagine that a strip club right smack in the middle of these institutions would not be in the best interest of North Miami, its residents, visitors or its children.  Not to mention Elmo.

Then there’s also the fact that if a patron of this “adult entertainment establishment” were to stumble out the door and cross the street, he’d spill right into our City “Now More Beautiful,” North Miami Beach.  In this section of the map of NMB, you can see the strip club will be located right on the border of NE 151 Street, which separates the two cities.

In other words, what goes on in North Miami will not necessarily stay in North Miami.  Any trouble that might happen at this club will become North Miami Beach’s problem.  Our police have enough crap to deal with as it is, they certainly don’t need to be distracted by North Miami’s problems that will most definitely become ours.

If North Miami wants a strip club, surely there’s some out of the way side street to put it, away from schools, parks, classy businesses and Big Bird.  It seem to me that the North Miami city council should learn from our mistakes and not showcase an “adult entertainment establishment” in such a highly visible area.  It’s not as if this place will improve North Miami’s image, especially when that city has been showing remarkable progress.  I’m just saying.

A final word is in order about both cities’ ordinances prohibiting alcohol and nudity from being under one roof:  Are you serious?  I don’t know who thought up this stupid rule, but it seems to me that if a woman is wearing nothing but a pasty and a g-string, she’s already naked for all intents and purposes.  And banana warmers on male strippers are just plain ridiculous.  Are you gonna tell me that booze drinkers who want to see naked bodies will let a no-alcohol rule stop them from imbibing before, as opposed to while, they’re being “entertained?”  If a drinker is bound and determined to booze up and see titties, he’ll start drinking at home and weave his way to the club behind the wheel of a car.  I’d rather see all the drunks arrive sober, be contained in one building, and have the bartender take away their keys and call them a cab to bring them home.  Doesn’t that make perfect sense?  Then again, maybe it’s just me.

NOTE:  Perhaps, just perhaps, if the bartender at Swinging Richards had been a little more careful about cutting him off, the Hollywood city manager wouldn’t have gotten himself arrested for a DUI on the way home.  I sure hope the poor schmuck was already out of the closet BEFORE he made headlines.  If not, oy vey!

Speaking of Swinging Richards, despite what some people have been saying, it is not being targeted for violating the no-booze rule because it’s a gay bar.  Apparently all three North Miami Beach strip clubs are under the gun.  Swinging Richards’ Federal discrimination lawsuit against the city has been dropped, so put that rumor to bed already.

In any event, although some people believe it’s the government’s duty to legislate “morality,” the fact remains that “the adult entertainment industry” is a legitimate business whether you like it or not.  Local governments certainly don’t have the right to bar those legitimate businesses from setting up shop.  The only things municipalities have control over are responsible zoning laws and strict code enforcement.  If elected officials don’t follow these basic common sense rules, their cities will end up looking like North Miami Beach.

North Miami, are you paying attention?

Stephanie Kienzle
“Spreading the Wealth”