Minneapolis- The Minneapolis City Council last month voted to grant a business license to a strip club whose neighbor will be a popular Christian nightspot.
The council voted 10-3 to grant the license to Divas Gentlmen’s Club even after the council’s public safety and regulatory services committee recommended to deny it.
The issue at the council meeting was whether Three Degrees’ claim to be a church was enough to uphold a city ordinance that no sexually themed business “shall be allowed within 500 feet of a religious institution place of assembly.”
Mike Nigai, Divas’ co-owner, said he was happy with the outcome. “We’ve waited a year for this. Now we can get down to business,” he said.
Nigai said the club could open within the next couple of months
The co-founder of Club Three Degrees, Nancy Aleksuk, said that she was surprised by the result and that the club might look into legal action.
Back story: Minneapolis The Minneapolis City Council granted a business license to Divas Gentlemen’s Club in August, stirring up controversy on one downtown entertainment block.
The issue is that the club would be right down the block from the Christian nightclub called Club 3 Degrees on North 5th Street.
In the center of the fight is defining what makes a church a church.
Club 3 Degrees looks and sounds like a nightclub, but the pastors there say their mission is ministry.
Pastor Nancy Aleksuk said, “Our whole focus has always been to make Christianity relevant and accessible.”
Not everybody sees it that way, including several members of the Minneapolis City Council.
“Club 3 Degrees is a nightclub,” councilman Ralph Remington said. “Other services may occur within that, but it’s primarily a nightclub.”
The Christian club objected to Divas Gentleman’s club opening down the block.
A city ordinance forbids sexually-oriented businesses from operating within 500 feet of religious institutions. Some on the council argued the Christian club is really a church with different packaging.
“These people are serious about ministry,” councilman Don Samuels said. “They’re very devout and this is a sacred space.”
But the majority of the council agreed Divas had the right to open and granted their business license.
Mike Nigai, Divas “The zoning administrator told me himself that we’re zoned for it, everything was right. According to their own ordinance we did nothing wrong.”
Club 3 Degrees may have fallen victim to its own very successful marketing strategy.
“I think if we had a steeple and some pews and an organ we may not be having this discussion,” Aleksuk said. “Because we’ve chosen a contemporary way to market that, it’s almost come back to bite us a little bit.”
Divas plans to open in October. In the meantime, the leadership at Club Three degrees is not giving up. They’re looking into other legal options. The pastors say the broader issue is their freedom of religious expression.
The strip club Dreamgirls is also within 500 feet of Club 3 Degrees, but it was there before the Christian Club. The pastors at 3 Degrees say Divas is more in the path of their visit.