So this business has been on Main Street for the past 30 years and suddenly the city has decided that they no longer want that type of business there (adult store). Can the city do that? Why are they so worried suddenly? Is there someone interested in that venue that has some sort of influence? I mean Main Street is full of bars and night clubs all over already. They don’t mind those. — Anonymous, Calexico<
We wondered why this would be coming up, so we figured the adult bookstore in El Centro must finally be ready to close its doors after four years of preparation.
That’s right. Four years. This is not some sudden action by the city of El Centro to close down the bookstore. If anything, the city has allowed the bookstore to live out its lease agreement or whatever it had in place since the operation of the bookstore was zoned out of the downtown in late mid-July 2009. The process began much earlier in late 2008.
At the time of the writing of the Probe question, we were knee deep in the holidays and finding sources was difficult, so we may need to follow this up.
But, what we can tell you is, in 2008 a well-known adult bookstore company from San Diego — F Street Bookstore — began the process to set up shop in El Centro. At that time the city began to revisit where it would allow such businesses by revisiting its zoning ordinances.
In that process, bookstores like the one in downtown El Centro, with coin-operated video/peep shows were zoned out of the downtown and zoned in to industrial areas of the city only.
What we need to check on and understand is how the bookstore was allowed to stay in the downtown so long. In July 2009, the business was to be granted up to a year and a half to live out its lease. What happened to extend that more than two years is unclear.
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