Whitaker City Zoning Code
ARTICLE II
Intent and Purpose
§ 440-2 Intent and purpose.
This chapter is adopted for the following purposes:
A.
To promote and to protect the health, safety and general welfare of the inhabitants of Whitaker Borough, and of the public generally;
B.
To encourage and facilitate the orderly growth and expansion of the municipality;
C.
To protect the character and maintain the stability of residential, commercial and industrial areas within the Borough;
D.
To provide adequate light, air, privacy, and convenience of access to property;
E.
To divide the Borough into zones and districts restricting and regulating herein the location, construction, reconstruction, alteration and use of buildings, structures and land for residential, commercial, industrial, and other uses, with a view to conserving the value of building and encouraging the most appropriate use of land throughout the municipality;
F.
To establish building lines and the location of buildings designed for uses within such lines;
G.
To provide uses, buildings or structures which are compatible with the character of development or the permitted uses within specified zoning districts;
H.
To regulate such additions to, and alterations or remodeling of existing buildings or structures as would not comply with the restrictions and limitations imposed hereinafter;
I.
To encourage efficient circulation in the public streets by providing for off-street parking of motor vehicles and for the loading and unloading of commercial vehicles and so protect the public health, safety and the general welfare;
J.
To provide protection against fire, explosion, noxious fumes, and other hazards in the interest of the public health, safety, comfort and general welfare;
K.
To provide for the gradual elimination of those uses of land, buildings and structures which do not conform with the standards of the districts in which they are located and are adversely affecting the development of other property in each district;
L.
To define and limit the powers and duties of the administrative officers and bodies as provided herein; and
M.
To regulate sexually oriented businesses within the Borough for the purpose set forth below based upon the findings set forth below:
[Added 11-12-2008 by Ord. No. 3-2008]
(1)
Purpose.
(a)
Pursuant to the authority granted by the Municipalities Planning Code, 53 P.S. § 10101 et seq., and 68 Pa.C.S.A. § 5501, to promote and secure the health, cleanliness, comfort, and safety of the citizens of the Borough of Whitaker, to regulate places of public entertainment, amusement and recreation, and to prevent and prohibit adverse secondary effects, the Borough of Whitaker enacts the regulations set forth herein to minimize and control the adverse secondary effects of sexually oriented businesses and thereby to protect the health, safety, and welfare of its citizens, to protect the citizens' property values and predominantly residential character of the Borough and to deter the spread of blight.
(b)
The Borough has determined that zoning regulation is a legitimate means of insuring that the operators of sexually oriented businesses comply with reasonable regulations and to insure that operators do not knowingly allow their establishments to be used as places of illegal sexual activity or solicitation.
(c)
It is not the intent of the Borough to suppress any speech protected by the First Amendment of the United States Constitution, but to enact content neutral regulations addressing the secondary effects of sexually oriented businesses. It is not the intent of the Borough to deny any person rights of free speech protected by the Constitution of the United States or the Constitution of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, or both, nor is it the intent of the Borough to impose any additional limitations or restrictions on the content of any communicative materials, including sexually oriented films, videotapes, books and other materials. Further, it is not the intent of the Borough to deny or restrict the rights of any adult to view or obtain any sexually oriented materials or conduct protected by the Constitution of the United States or the Constitution of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, or both, nor does it intend to restrict or deny any constitutionally protected rights that distributors or exhibitors of sexually oriented material may have to sell, distribute or exhibit these materials.
(2)
Findings.
(a)
Law enforcement personnel have determined, and statistics and studies performed in a substantial number of communities in this Commonwealth and in the United States indicate that sexually oriented businesses have adverse secondary effects, including those specified and identified at 68 Pa.C.S.A. § 5501(a), and these secondary effects should be regulated to protect public health, safety, and welfare. These secondary effects include, but are not limited to, the spread of communicable diseases, performance of sexual acts in public places, presence of discarded sexually oriented materials on public and private property, sexual harassment, obscenity, prostitution and other illegal sexual activities, crime and neighborhood deterioration.
(b)
Based upon evidence concerning the adverse secondary effects of adult uses on the community as set forth in reports incorporated or referenced in the cases of Renton v. Playtime Theatres, 475 U.S. 41 (1986); Young v. American Mini Theatres, 426 U.S. 50 (1976); Barnes v. Glen Theatre, Inc., 501 U.S. 560 (1991); Erie v. Pap's A.M., 529 U.S. 277 (2000); and on studies in other communities including but not limited to Phoenix, Arizona; Minneapolis, Minnesota; Houston, Texas; Indianapolis, Indiana; Amarillo, Texas; Biloxi, Mississippi; Seattle, Washington; Oklahoma City, Oklahoma; Cleveland, Ohio; and Beaumont, Texas, the Borough finds:
[1]
Sexually oriented businesses lend themselves to ancillary unlawful and unhealthy activities that are presently uncontrolled by the operators of the establishments. Further, there is presently no mechanism to make the owners of these establishments responsible for the activities that occur on their premises;
[2]
Certain employees of sexually oriented businesses defined in this chapter as adult theaters and cabarets engage in higher incidence of certain types of illicit sexual behavior than employees of other establishments;
[3]
Sexual acts, including masturbation and oral and anal sex, occur at sexually oriented businesses especially those which provided private or semiprivate booths or cubicles for viewing films, videos or live sex shows;
[4]
Offering and providing such space encourages such activities which create unhealthy conditions;
[5]
Persons frequent certain adult theaters, adult arcades and other sexually oriented businesses for the purpose of engaging in sex within the premises of such sexually oriented businesses;
[6]
At least 50 communicable diseases may be spread by activities occurring in sexually oriented businesses including but not limited to syphilis, gonorrhea, human immunodeficiency virus infection (HIV), genital herpes, hepatitis B, Non A, Non B amebiasis, salmonella infections and shigella infections;
[7]
The report of the Surgeon General of the United States dated October 22, 1986, advised the American public that AIDS/HIV infection may be transmitted through sexual contact, intravenous drug use, exposure to infected blood and blood components and from an infected mother to a child;
[8]
According to the best scientific evidence, HIV and AIDS infection as well as syphilis arid gonorrhea are principally transmitted by sexual acts;
[9]
Sanitary conditions in some sexually oriented businesses are unhealthy, in part, because of the activities conducted there are unhealthy, and in part, because of the unregulated nature of the activities and the failure of the owners and operators of the facilities to self regulate those activities or to maintain those facilities;
[10]
Numerous studies and reports have determined that semen is found in the areas of sexually oriented businesses where persons view adult-oriented films;
[11]
Numerous studies and reports have indicated that sexually oriented businesses have a substantial negative impact on property values and cause neighborhood blight and that appropriate zoning regulations will help prevent the negative impact of those secondary effects on the community;
[12]
The findings noted in Subsection M(2)(b)[1] through [11]raise substantial governmental concerns.