Thursday, May 31, 2012    Text size: 

LOS ANGELES — City Council on Wednesday will hear a city official's request for a 90-day extension to craft rules regulating porn productions within Los Angeles city limits.

The city's Adult Film Industry Working Group — a panel composing of nearly a dozen city, county and state officials — has met three times already to craft a master plan to implement the ordinance, which makes condoms mandatory for performers at on-location adult film productions.

The full council is expected to hear communication from City Administrative Officer Miguel Santana, who presides over the panel, over why the Adult Film Industry Working Group couldn't come up with proposed rules to implement the porn-condom ordinance in a timely manner. The item is No. 10 on the City Council agenda slated for Wednesday.

The ordinance was passed by City Council and signed into law by Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa in January. 

At its last meeting, Adult Film Industry Working Group panel members were reminded of  legal consequences, including constitutional issues involved in attempting enforcement, associated with the ordinance from a number of public speakers, including industry attorneys Allan Gelbard and Michael Fattorosi and Free Speech Coalition Executive Director Diane Duke.

After the meeting, the Adult Film Industry Working Group postponed its meetings one after another, eventually declaring that it needed more time.

The "Safer Sex in the Adult Industry Act" ordinance currently isn't being enforced in the city, and it could take until early September for the panel to report back to the City Council over proposed rules to enforce it.

The local adult entertainment production community is under threat with the ordinance because Los Angeles' San Fernando Valley, known as Porn Valley, counts more than 100 adult film studios, 800 performers and about 3,000 closely working in the industry.

And just last week, the AIDS Healthcare Foundation, which initiated the city porn-condom initiative, announced that it submitted 360,000 petition signatures for a Los Angeles county ballot initiative mandating the use of condoms in adult productions throughout the county, which covers some 4,000 square miles and 88 cities, not including unincorporated areas.

City Council meets on Wednesday at City Hall, 200 N. Spring St., Los Angeles. The meeting allocates time for public comment.