North Carolina- The Aberdeen Town Board voted unanimously Monday to adopt an ordinance that would regulate the display and sale of sexually explicit material.
The action came after a public hearing.
John David McCray, who originally asked the town to pass the ordinance, stressed that the ordinance would not prohibit the sale of such material, but would instead limit its display.
“It’s not infringing on anyone’s rights to sell the merchandise, but it does protect the rights of residents to protect their children and grandchildren from seeing it,” he said during the public hearing. “It was my hope that the town of Aberdeen would be the first to pass the ordinance, and I hope that Moore County passes a countywide ordinance.”
Marva Kirk read a statement from her church, the Pinehurst ward of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.
“We abhor pornography that seems to be flooding the land,” she read from the statement. “Legislation makes an effort to curb it, but the best way to stop it is to have men and women with their families, build barriers against it. We ask you, do you good people of the community want this ugly vice to corrupt your families and your neighbors?”
She also said that from her experience as a former crime scene investigator in Greenville, S.C., and as a former U.S. deputy marshal, “pornographic material was almost always seen at the scenes of those crimes, whether they were robberies, murders or rapes.”
“As a member of the business community,” she continued, “I can tell you we do not buy gas from stores that sell those magazines.”
Kirk asked how the ordinance would be enforced, and whether video stores would be involved.
Mayor Betsy Mofield confirmed that video material would be subject to the same language in the ordinance and said the town would enforce it through resident complaints.
The intent of the ordinance is to regulate the direct commercial distribution of sexually explicit materials to minors and to help parents and guardians in supervising and controlling access of minors to such materials. It allows for public display and sale, but the material must be placed in racks, shelves or display cases separate from racks, shelves or other display cases for material that is not sexually explicit.
The racks or display cases for sexually explicit material must be constructed with a full opaque or solid barrier that fully screens from view the sexually explicit portions of the materials, such as magazine titles. The racks or shelves may not be designed so sexually explicit materials can be easily removed and perused by nonminors.
All racks, shelves and display cases that contain sexually explicit material would be continuously visible without obstruction from the cash register or other purchase location by the proprietor or an employee, either directly or by means of mirrors or closed circuit monitors. The cash register or other purchase location would have to be tended by a person who is responsible for preventing minors from perusing, inspecting or leafing through sexually explicit materials.
The Town Board also held a public hearing on the application for a general-purpose amendment to the town’s code of ordinances to extend its minimum housing code to include extraterritorial jurisdiction.
During the hearing, Planning Board member Maurice Holland, who proposed the amendment, asked the board what time frames would be allowed.
“I live in this district, and in some instances, it would be quite expensive to comply with the ordinance immediately,” he said. “If the money isn’t there, I’d like to see some cooperative solution.”
Town Manager Bill Zell said that staff would identify the problem and assess the impact it would have on safety and public health. They would prepare a notice and set a hearing date within 10 and 30 days.
“The decision made would certainly give residents reasonable time,” he said. “It’s not as though we have our eye on certain properties, and we have several properties within town limits that need to be addressed. Basically we’d work on it with the homeowner anyway we need to.”
The ordinance amendment passed unanimously.
In other business, the board voted after holding a public hearing to approve an application for a zoning code text amendment from the Park at Clearwater apartment complex. It involves a change to the R-6 Residential District of the town’s zoning code.
The board also voted to appoint Owen Gallagher and Bob Rigsby as new members of the Planning Board to fill two of four open seats. Roger Bone resigned his seat to serve on the county Planning Board. The board chairman, Jim Thomas, whose term has expired, will remain until a replacement is appointed. The terms of Kemp Lowder and Bill Prevatte have also expired.
Zell said the Board of Commissioners is still in the process of finding people who want to serve on the planning board.