The news was a relief in some ways, but it didn't satisfy many people at Today’s Jasper County Commission meeting.
A plan for a strip club at the interchange between County Road 110 and Interstate 44 has apparently been nixed, and in its place is a proposal for a separate bar, serving alcohol, and an adult video store, in the same building.
Presiding Commissioner John Bartosh said a representative of Ernest Doyon, the Wichita businessman who owns the building that would house the businesses, came in Wednesday and filled out the county's new business license application. Bartosh said the representative told him there would be no strip club in the building.
"I don't know exactly how this will work," Bartosh said. "We've still got some issues to deal with. I told the representative that I want him to come down and tell us in writing exactly what's going to go into that building. There have been too many rumors and ideas and lies and we need to know from him exactly what will go in before we'll issue the license."
Residents of the area seemed somewhat relieved that they may have had an impact on the business, but they still had concerns as well.
John Putnam, an organizer of the group opposed to the strip club, said he received a call from Joplin attorney Bill Fleishaker, who asked him if neighbors would be opposed to girls in bikinis dancing and serving drinks as they were to nude dancing.
"He said it would be no different than what you would see at a public swimming pool," Putnam said. "I wonder if he's not trying to tweak his business to comply with the letter of the law. We're still concerned about combining a sexually oriented business with alcohol."
Putnam and Jim Valenti, another organizer of the group, presented the commissioners with a petition with more than 250 signatures supporting extending the regulations commissioners have passed for cabarets to adult video stores and other sexually oriented businesses.
Western District Commissioner Darieus Adams said the county prosecuting attorney is working closely with the authors of an ordinance in Jackson County that closely regulated all kinds of sexually oriented businesses.
Valenti said he is glad the business won't be a strip club, but he and the group plan to stay on top of the situation and keep working to get sexually oriented businesses out of Jasper County.
"We have land-use studies that indicate that crime follows sexually oriented businesses," Putnam said. "When you have bikinis and alcohol and adult videos in one environment, it's a recipe for disaster."
