Opinion ID: 1420061
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Denial of the Injunction

Text: The City argues the trial court improperly denied an injunction against Pic-A-Flick. We disagree. The granting of temporary injunctive relief is within the sound discretion of the trial court and will not be overturned absent an abuse of that discretion. Fuller-Ahrens Partnership v. South Carolina Dept. of Highways and Public Transp., 311 S.C. 177, 427 S.E.2d 920 (Ct.App.1993). An abuse of discretion occurs where the trial court is controlled by an error of law or where the Court's order is based on factual conclusions without evidentiary support. Stanton v. Town of Pawley's Island, 309 S.C. 126, 420 S.E.2d 502 (1992). In order for a city to get an injunction for a zoning violation they must show: (1) that it has an ordinance covering the situation; and (2) that there is a violation of that ordinance. See 42 Am.Jur.2d Injunctions § 38 (1969). Here, the trial court found the City would likely be unable to show a violation of the Ordinance because the City failed to provide the trial court with a constitutional definition of principal business purpose that it uses in enforcing the Ordinance. Our United States Supreme Court has held that businesses providing non-obscene, sexually explicit material are entitled to protection by the First and Fourteenth Amendment. See Young v. American Mini Theatres, Inc., 427 U.S. 50, 96 S.Ct. 2440, 49 L.Ed.2d 310 (1976); City of Renton v. Playtime Theatres, Inc., 475 U.S. 41, 106 S.Ct. 925, 89 L.Ed.2d 29 (1986); see also Barnes v. Glen Theatre, Inc., 501 U.S. 560, 111 S.Ct. 2456, 115 L.Ed.2d 504 (1991)(recognizing that nude dancing also receives First Amendment protection). However, the Supreme Court has also recognized sexually-oriented businesses may have negative secondary effects, such as an increase in crime, on their surrounding communities. Young, 427 U.S. at 71, 96 S.Ct. at 2452-53. In light of these secondary effects, the Supreme Court has allowed local governments to regulate sexually oriented businesses, not based on the content of the speech, but as a response to their negative impact on the community. Id. Zoning restrictions on store location, such as in the Ordinance, are one mechanism municipalities may use to regulate adult video stores. The Ordinance classifies adult video stores by whether a principal business purpose of the store is the sale or rental of the specified merchandise. A definition of principal business purpose is not contained in the Ordinance. To determine principal business purpose, the zoning administrator testified that he looks at whether a store promoted the adult material and whether the adult movies were kept in an area of restricted access. However, the City zoning administrator also testified that he would still consider Pic-A-Flick to be an adult video store if it did not advertise the adult videos and they were not kept in a restricted area. The City zoning administrator finally admitted under cross examination that the City's position is the sale of even one movie described by the Ordinance can make a business an adult video store and subject to the Ordinance. [3] Since the zoning administrator could not supply a clear definition of principal business purpose, the trial court found that it was unlikely that the City would prevail in showing a zoning violation by Pic-Flick. The trial court also relied on the evidence that adult videos represented less than 5% of Pic-A-Flick's revenue to find that the City was not likely to prevail on the merits of the action. This ruling was not, as the City mischaracterizes it, a ruling that by law less than 5% sales of adult videos is allowable under the Ordinance. Instead, the trial court found that unless the City could provide more guidance on the standard it uses to enforce the Ordinance, he was not going to preliminarily enjoin Pic-A-Flick based on such minimal numbers. We agree with the City's argument that the trial court should not have looked to see whether Pic-A-Flick created deleterious (secondary) effects in the neighborhood. Municipalities do not have to show negative secondary effects in order to enforce adult zoning provisions. As this Court held in Restaurant Row Associates v. Horry County, 335 S.C. 209, 220, 516 S.E.2d 442, 448 (1999): Adult businesses cannot exclude themselves from legitimate zoning regulation by providing expert testimony that they do not currently produce negative secondary effects. Local governments have the power to zone the location of adult businesses without any individualized showing the businesses produce negative secondary effects. Here, Pic-A-Flick cannot rely on a lack of secondary effects evidence to argue that they are not a sexually-oriented business. However, the trial court's error is harmless in that it correctly found that the Ordinance did not provide a definition for a principal business purpose and the City zoning administrator could not tell the court how it enforced that provision of the Ordinance. The trial court made no errors of law that would justify the reversal of its decision not to grant the injunction. While the trial court may have erroneously based its refusal to enjoin Pic-A-Flick on the fact that Pic-A-Flick did not create deleterious secondary effects, reversal of this error would not change the outcome of the trial court's decision denying the injunction. If there isn't a definition of principal business purpose that the City can articulate to the trial court, the City cannot argue that businesses such as Pic-A-Flick have as a principal business purpose the retail of the covered material.