Mpls city attorney calls for tax on strip clubs

Mpls city attor­ney calls for tax on strip clubs

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Gov­ern­ment pro­grams designed to reduce the exploita­tion of chil­dren need money, and the Min­neapo­lis city attor­ney thinks she has found the solu­tion in a tax on strip clubs.

City Attor­ney Susan Segal says she wants the City Coun­cil to con­sider ask­ing the state for per­mis­sion to impose on a fee on venues offer­ing nude or par­tially nude entertainment.

She tells the Star Tri­bune (http://bit.ly/paLDdX) the money raised would be used to com­bat child pros­ti­tu­tion and sex traf­fick­ing. The coun­cil is sched­uled to dis­cuss the issue next month.

Segal’s pro­posal is based on a sim­i­lar fee in Texas, often called a “pole tax.” The 2007 law charges nude enter­tain­ment venues serv­ing alco­hol $5 per customer.

A lawyer who often rep­re­sents Min­nesota strip clubs calls the idea unconstitutional.

Posted by AP News on Oct 23 2011. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.