What Kittery Found at the Porn Shop

From the minutes of a meeting of the Kittery Town Council, February 27, 2006 (emphasis added):

a. (020206-1) THE KITTERY TOWN COUNCIL MOVES TO HOLD A PUBLIC
HEARING ON AND HEREBY ORDAINS CHAPTER 5.40, AN ORDINANCE REQUIRING
LICENSES FOR VIEWING BOOTHS OF ADULT ENTERTAINMENT ESTABLISHMENTS.
…Police Chief Strong came forward and said everyone was aware that this establishment had
been a bone of contention for a long time. Although they had other regulations toward that
establishment, it had come to his attention that there were either illegal activities going on or activities that were detrimental to the health and welfare of patrons and the general public. They started to pick up intelligence and interviewed a former employee, who had been in a managerial role for the company. During that interview, they were informed about certain activities and that basically it was a meeting place for homosexual males to meet people and engage in sex inside the booths and bathrooms, which the informant indicated he had personally witnessed. The Department continued to monitor the establishment and to research websites. The Chief made a sketch on the board for Council to see the establishment’s basic layout; the doors to “peek” booths were lockable from the inside.

Chief Strong said Fernald Road residents had complained about finding offensive trash on
the road and the Department did their own surveillance, finding such items as empty pill bottles, lubricants, leather straps, movies, and used condoms within 100 yards of the rear of the establishment on Fernald Road. The Chief said they made the decision to send people in under cover and on two occasions, he sent two plain clothes detectives into Amazing.Net, arming them with special glasses and a portable ultraviolet light, which when shined on an area would illuminate body fluids. On January 30, two detectives went inside dressed in plain clothes and equipped with the ultraviolet light, as well as collection material. They entered booths, closed the doors, turned on the ultraviolet light and observed what appeared to be tremendous amounts of body fluids on all three walls and on the floor. The next night, the detectives followed the same procedure. Samples were sent to the Main Street Lab and on February 13, 2006, he received the results confirming that all swabbings taken in the four booths contained semen. The Chief said their informant told them that on numerous occasions he had tried to clean but had not been given any information on how to wash the areas properly. Police Chief Strong said he believed the collection of material they made, along with the lab results, showed beyond a reasonable doubt that there were body fluids being exchanged or deposited that other people were exposed to and asked Council if they had any questions.

Addressing Town Attorney Duncan McEachern, Councilor Brock asked if he was going to
talk about the Ordinance itself? Attorney McEachern said they were trying to discourage the type of activity related by the Chief and decided the best way to do that was to prohibit any doors, curtains or any other type of covering on these booths that prevented the ability to see into them. As a result, they came up with an ordinance that proposed to regulate the use of these viewing booths by eliminating the ability to lock them, as well as not allowing a booth to be occupied by more than one patron at any one time. The ordinance also contained construction regulations so the booths would have to have floors and sidings that could be easily washed and they were to have solid partitions to prevent communication between people in neighboring booths. Attorney McEachern said this ordinance allowed Council to license the booths so that anyone in Town who had these viewing booths as part of their business operation would have to come before this Council for a license to have them for a year and that license would have to be renewed. The applicant would come before the Council and Council would have the benefit of a pre-inspection by the CEO, Police Chief or Fire Chief to satisfy not only the requirements of this order but also other ordinances. Attorney McEachern said this was not an ordinance that would forbid viewing booths as part of a business, that it was the type of activity associated with them that they were
attempting to regulate to the degree that they could.

Councilor Shwaery asked about the licensing procedure and accompanying fee. Attorney
McEachern said there would be a certain amount of cost involved with pre-inspecting so the fee was an attempt to recoup the costs involved since the inspecting individuals were paid by the Town. Police Chief Strong said, along with that, it would give them something to revoke. They could actually revoke their license and shut them down. The Town Attorney said this ordinance was intended to apply to any type of establishment but this was the only establishment in Kittery that presently fell into that category. The ordinance gave what basically would be 90 days for someone to comply.

CHAIRPERSON GRINNELL MOVED TO ORDAIN CHAPTER 5.40, AN ORDINANCE REQUIRING LICENSES FOR VIEWING BOOTHS OF ADULT ENTERTAINMENT ESTABLISHMENTS, SECONDED BY COUNCILOR HEILSHORN….

A ROLL CALL VOTE WAS TAKEN ON THE MOTION, AS AMENDED, WITH ALL
IN FAVOR. MOTION PASSES 7/0.