The Missionary Sisters of St. Charles Borromeo, who have been battling their neighbor in Stone Park, Illinois, for several years because it is an alcohol-serving strip club, have won a small battle – but it may prove to be a turning point.
The Thomas More Society, which has been defending the Catholic sisters, say the town has revoked the strip club’s liquor license, because the club is too close to a chapel at the nuns’ facility.
But that’s not their ultimate objective.
“We are hopeful that the revocation of Club Allure’s liquor license is a significant step in shutting down Club Allure permanently,” said Joan Mannix, a special counsel to the legal organization.
It was the Stone Park Liquor Commission that revoked the license that previously had been given to Club Allure, based on a city ordinance forbidding a liquor license within 100 feet of a church.
The city’s liquor control commissioner signed the order revoking the license.
The city, according to Thomas More, “relied upon the facts presented in a similar case in which the courts held that a convent chapel, like the three chapels located on the property of the Missionary Sisters, was a ‘church’ based on evidence that it was open to the public for mass, benediction, prayers and devotions and contained all the necessities for the ordinary functions of a Catholic church.”
The order was signed by Benamino Mazzulla, who is both mayor and liquor control commissioner. He cited the city’s ban on liquor licenses within 100 feet of a church.
Then he wrote: “The Sisters’ property is one contiguous campus that shall be considered as a whole for the purposes of measuring the 100 foot distance. The evidence shows that the Sisters’ property includes three churches and that the Sisters’ property abuts the Club Allure property.
“The evidence further shows that the building that houses Fatima House includes a ‘church’ and that this building spans multiple parcels, including the parcel that abuts Club Allure’s property. … The Sisters’ campus, which includes three churches, abuts the Club Allure property, which makes the relevant distance zero. Accordingly, the licenses issued to licenesee are in violation of Section 111.05(c) of the Village Code because Club Allure is within 100 feet of three churches.”
The sisters had presented testimony that Catholic mass is held daily, there is seating for about 250 in just one of the chapels and it is open to the public.
The fight over the presence of the strip club adjacent to the Catholic facility erupted several years ago.
Thomas More Society representatives earlier brought the allegation that Club Allure “has been engaging in the lucrative business of selling what constitutes prostitution under Illinois criminal law.”
Further, there have been multiple incidents of public violence, fights, mob action and battery and more there, Thomas More said.
City officials allegedly had decided to grant a variety of permissions to the strip club to operate to resolve a lawsuit its owners had brought against the city. But then they allegedly failed to properly notify neighbors and follow the rules for rezoning property for adult entertainment.
Municipal officials also have threatened the nuns with arrest should they protest the club and “retaliated against the sisters by refusing to grant permission for the sisters to hold one of their Stations of the Cross in the public right of way (in anticipation of Holy Week on Palm Sunday before Easter on March 24, 2013) without giving any plausible reason,” a legal complaint in the case charges.
from PropagandaGuard https://propagandaguard.wordpress.com/2016/11/19/convent-wins-battle-strip-club-loses-liquor-license/
from WordPress https://toddmsiebert.wordpress.com/2016/11/19/convent-wins-battle-strip-club-loses-liquor-license/
No comments:
Post a Comment