This past Wednesday December 29, 2010, SD State Senator-Elect Elizabeth Kraus, her husband Jim, and Pastor Scott Craig (KSLT/KLMP Public Policy Director) traveled with Dale Bartscher, Executive Director of the ‘Family Heritage Alliance’ to Lead, SD where the Family Heritage Alliance held a ‘Lead Community Meeting’. It was there that we discussed the up coming City Commissioner’s Meeting and their proposed Adult Orientated Business Ordinance (AOB’s) which, if approved, will allow AOB’s to begin operation within their city limits. We had nearly 40 folks in attendance and you could have cut the ‘passion’ in the room with a knife. It was a terrific evening of encouraging those folks, helping them set a winning strategy and seeing them step up and claim the ‘high ground’ in this fight for that which is right.
This coming Monday evening January 3, 2011 @ 5:00p.m, Dale Bartscher will give testimony at the City Commissioner’s meeting @ the Lead City Hall. He and the family oriented people of Lead deserve your support and encouragement in stopping the operation of AOB’s in the city limits of Lead. PLEASE MAKE PLANS TO ATTEND THIS MEETING AND SHOW YOUR SUPPORT FOR DECENCY.
The Family Heritage Alliance is supporting the good citizens of Lead as they strive to hold back the city’s rush to establishing nude dancing rules. These new rules will only but accommodate a local Lead Adult Orientated Business, the ‘Wild Thing’ bar.
For more information go to the following Rapid City Journal LINK posted: Tuesday, December 21, 2010 6:30 am.
The following is an e-mail recently sent by the FHA Executive Director to each of the Lead City Commissioners and Mayor:
Dear City Commissioner,
I trust you and yours have had a wonderful ‘Christmas’ and now look forward to a great ‘New Year’. I wish to ‘thank you’ for your service to the great community of Lead as one of their City Commissioners.
We have been closely monitoring the news coming out of Lead concerning the ‘Wild Thing’ bar. Recently a number of Lead residents have been in contact with us. They are concerned about the possibility of an AOB Ordinance being approved which would allow the ‘Wild Thing’ bar to include adult nude dancing.
There is no doubt but that revenues for the ‘Wild Thing’ bar will go up if they are allowed to continue with adult nude dancing, however, at what cost to the city of Lead? Study after study indicates clearly that the only ones who profit from an AOB are those who make it and sell it. It will hurt your community, families and children. Yes, it will eventually undercut your community’s safety.
One must ask, “What really goes on inside a sexually oriented business such as this?” For your information I’d like to give you an inside view of the ‘strip bar business’. I’m including a website that details testimony of some of those who once worked in the industry. They will provide for you the most telling insight. Read what they have to say by simply CLICKING HERE: http://www.ccv.org/issues/sex-oriented-businesses/stripbars-an-inside-view/
The ‘Family Heritage Alliance’ supports the citizens of Lead and their concern for healthy community values. Dr. Victor Cline, a clinical psychologist from the University of Utah, has found a near-universal pattern associated with pornography use and concludes, “The major consequence of being addicted to pornography is not the probability or possibility of committing a serious sex crime (though this can and does occur), but rather the disturbance of the fragile bonds of intimate family and marital relationships. This is where the most grievous pain, damage, and sorrow occur.” Yes, your Lead citizens have every reason to be concerned about the direction you as a City Commissioner now take the city when it comes to your AOB ordinance.
If this AOB is allowed to operate it’s adult nude dancing then there will be problems both inside and outside this sexually orientated business. Inside the nude dancing establishment, patrons and dancers often engage in public sexual contact; private dances are opportunities for acts of prostitution. Outside you will find that the neighborhood or business district surrounding sex businesses typically suffers a decline in property values and increases in crime, especially sex crimes. So, property values go down, crime rate and abuse go up! This certainly should make one pause and consider the gravity of approving this type of business in your community.
This is more than just harmless fun or mere adult entertainment. There is proof of harm. The opening of this Pandora’s Box in your wonderful community will cause real harm to real people. We protect ourselves and our communities, in part, through the values we affirm as important. Treating every human being with respect, equality, and dignity, are values we should all be able to embrace, as a society and as individuals. The harms of sexually oriented businesses result from replacing respect, equality and dignity with a candy-coated message of greed.
Thank you for allowing me to take a moment of your time to discuss this issue at hand. I shall be looking forward to meeting you in the near future as I’ll be in attendance at this Monday night’s, January 3, City Commissioner’s meeting.
Standing for Faith, Family and Freedom,
Dale Bartscher, Executive Director
Family Heritage Alliance
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