Opinion ID: 1518464
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Discretion of Local Officials

Text: I do not see the considerable room for exercise of judgment by the official (Majority at 377 Md. 72-73, 832 A.2d at 181) found by the majority as a result of the County's use of the words distance and financial interest. According to the majority, all of § 128.H is unconstitutional because it provides no standard as to how its respective spatial distance requirements are to be measured. For example, the majority theorizes [d]istance could [be] measured ... door-to-door, or boundary line to boundary line. Id. Section 128.H.2.f, which reads [m]easurements shall be made in a straight line between the building containing the adult entertainment business and the building, zoning district, land use area, or lot, makes the standard more than clear enough. [12] The only arguable ambiguity seems to be as to where on the building, zoning district, land use area or lot to measure from or to, but in no case can the distance be less than the distance between the nearest point on the building containing the adult entertainment business and the nearest point on the adjacent building, zoning district, land use area or lot. This limited discretion is not unbridledit is strictly confined to the physical distance between the relevant points. [13] Neither the ambiguity of selecting what part of the building to use for measurement, nor the ambiguity created by the undefined term financial interest in § 128.H.6.a (requiring that the name of every person with a financial interest in the property or business be disclosed on the licensing application), is the kind that creates unbridled discretion as the U.S. Supreme Court uses that term. See Lakewood v. Plain Dealer Publishing Co., 486 U.S. 750, 757, 108 S.Ct. 2138, 2144, 100 L.Ed.2d 771, 782 (1988) (a licensing statute placing unbridled discretion in the hands of a government official or agency constitutes a prior restraint and may result in censorship). When the Supreme Court has struck down a statute for giving too much discretion to local officials, that statute either has provided no standards at all, see Lakewood, or has called for a totally subjective judgment, see Shuttlesworth v. Birmingham, 394 U.S. 147, 149-150, 89 S.Ct. 935, 938, 22 L.Ed.2d 162, 166 (1969) (The commission shall grant a written permit for such parade, procession or other public demonstration, ... unless in its judgment the public welfare, peace, safety, health, decency, good order, morals or convenience require that it be refused.). The hallmark of unbridled discretion is a subjective decision that is left to a government official and is not amenable to judicial review. That hallmark is not present in the ordinance in the present case. Even were I to find that the two provisions selected by the majority grant an impermissible level of discretion to local officials, I would save the statute by adopting a narrowing construction. This Court could choose, where reasonable and possible to do so, a constitutional interpretation. For example, I would construe the proper measure of distance to be from the nearest point on the building containing the adult entertainment business to the nearest point on the relevant other building, zoning district, land use area or lot, and financial interests to mean ownership interests. Such constructions would eliminate the discretion that so concerns the majority. See Posadas de Puerto Rico Assocs. v. Tourism Co., 478 U.S. 328, 347-48, 106 S.Ct. 2968, 2980, 92 L.Ed.2d 266, 285 (1986) (with respect to the bare statutory language ... we are bound by the Superior Court's narrowing construction of the statute. Viewed in light of that construction... we do not find the statute unconstitutionally vague). Imposing a constitutional construction through judicial gloss is preferable, in my view, to the drastic measure of declaring unconstitutional an entire legislative enactment.