Strip club foes organize rally
The Newburgh Town Board can expect a lively evening when it meets at 7 p.m. on Monday, March 6 – opponents of a so-called “gentlemen’s club” planned on Route 9W in the Middle Hope area of the town are planning a rally at Town Hall to share their feelings with local officials.
An email is circulating this week asking residents to call upon Supervisor Wayne Booth, Deputy Supervisor Gil Piaquadio and Council members George Woolsey, Betty Greene and Ernest Bello “to immediately issue a moratorium on all permits, approvals and building for new and existing adult use businesses.”
The email provides links to each of the local officials, making it easy to express their opinions and drive home the point that residents are opposed to a 6,000-square-foot adult restaurant and entertainment club directly behind the Fantasy Island strip club on Route 9W. The Blue Moon strip club has been a fixture at that location for more than 20 years.
When the Newburgh Town Board held its organizational meeting on Jan. 2, the board arrived expecting to see a few members of their families there to cheer them on as they were sworn in for a new term of office.
Instead, they found the room packed with protesters, armed with printed signs opposing the strip club. Interestingly, protesters were armed with other signs demanding the board “Let Us Speak,” indicating they anticipated being denied public comment that night.
Booth told the gathering that they could speak at a regular Town Board meeting, but that the business of the board that night was to be sworn in for a new term in office.
“This is our business,” opponents of the gentlemen’s club application said.
“This isn’t about formalities,” they cried out. “This is about the lives of our people. And that’s the most important thing that can happen.”
Opponents allege that the strip club will be “a breeding ground for drug activity, prostitution, criminal activity, sexual assault and disease.” They ask the Town Board to institute a moratorium on projects such as that planned for the Route 9W site.
On Feb. 6, Town Board members were given “homework” assignments by town attorney Mark Taylor. Taylor asked the council to read “and initial” a 13-part list of materials specifying the effects of adult or sexually oriented uses, studies, analyses and the effects of land use on property values. It would provide the board with knowledge it might need to make an informed decision on any possible moratorium.
The knowledge will likely prove valuable when citizens finally get their moment to speak up on March 6, something they feel they were denied on Jan. 2.
By ALLAN GAUL
agaul@tcnewspapers.com
I believe the meeting is Monday, March 5th…since the 6th is a Tuesday.
You can’t stop progress. Things change. Newburgh changes. What will be different with this business than is happening in every city? Nothing. Live and let live.The police will be around the area to protect the surrounding area. It could actually wind up being a better business with this strip joint there, then some other stores. I would think that the men that go to establishments like these try to keep everything on the hush-hush and not make waves. There is prostitution and drugs rampant in the City of Newburgh now. There is no guarantee that this proposed establishment will bring that type of criminal activity to the Town of Newburgh. All specualtion. Let them build what they want to for their business. Look within yourself to see the true devil.
The blue moon may have been there for 20 years-but most home owners have lived there longer
The blue moon had very little business-now with the large size and having it now being an establisment that catches your eyes is not what these home owners
need!!! Now it will be driving by with kids and having to explain what Middlehope has become!! Shouldn’t these kind of businesses be less eye catching
Now give another job for the police!! why start something you know is going to need the police-do the owners live in Middlehope-do they have children/grandchilden-family- in Middlehope??? will they love their pictures on the internet and news papers of the proud owners of this business-Matter of fact have the entire family from grandparents/parents/all children/all relatives be the picture on the building and all advertisements
They’re not ‘gentlemen’, they’re creeps. Gimme a break, why are there a bunch of these ‘businesses’ in the Town of Newburgh? Because they are not welcome elsewhere. I don’t think these guys would have been re-elected if the general populace knew what was being built on that location.
Sounds like someone is afraid that their husbands will be spending more time at the club than at their McMansions that are located above this club. This club was their before they bought those homes~so shame on you for not doing your homework first!
Complain yes, but all the facts published to date indicate that this establishment has met all legal requirements this town has put into place. This establishment has been here as long as many of those complaining moved into the area or allowed it to get its start. The time to complain was back then when you wrote and approved your zoning laws. The time to say no was not to move into the area. Simply because it provides a service you do not agree with is not enough to overturn the democratic process.