On Wednesday, April 5th at 1 p.m. the Zoning Board of Adjustment will meet to discuss the advisability of allowing an adult topless club, Scores, to locate about a block and a half from Philadelphia's historic district. Please read the press release below for more details.

You can join your neighbors who are opposed to an explicit adult use at this particular location by visiting www.hallwatch.org and then scrolling down to Active Letter Writing Campaigns and selecting Scores. Or, simply click here: OPPOSE SCORES

The opinion you post will be delivered to Mayor Street and others.

Press release:

The New York strip-club chain Scores has applied for an adult cabaret license in Philadelphia. The proposed location on North 6th Street borders Philadelphia's historic area and would be a block and a half from the National Constitution Center and Independence Mall, which is the heart of America's history and one of the most heavily traveled tourist destinations in the country.

As Governor Rendell noted in December, "I don't want a casino two blocks from the historic area. That would make no sense. If I were a family from Des Moines, that would turn me off."

If not a casino, then why a strip club?

North 6th Street is a popular tourist route because it affords easy access by car to the National Constitution Center, Independence Mall, and soon, Mayor Street's revitalization of Historic Franklin Square, a family friendly park featuring a playground and the Liberty Carousel.

Conversely, Scores categorizes the proposed 6th Street location as an "industrial area", and touts its strip club as "the highest and best use." But while the zoning may remain industrial, industrial users have largely vacated the area. Former warehouses are being converted into residential uses at a rapid pace to accomodate Center City's expansion.

Miles & Generalis, a real estate firm which has developed many projects in the immediate area, has invested $100 million in a 200-unit warehouse loft conversion at 444 North 4th Street. As Alex Generalis points out, 6th Street is becoming a "connecting corridor" that merges the new residential areas with the Independence Mall area. The presence of a strip club here "would seriously damage revitalization efforts."

The Reverend James D. Von Dreele, executive director of the Seamen's Church Institute, is also deeply concerned. Seamen's Church Institute has invested $5 million in its facilities at 475 North 5th Street. Scores "will degrade our investment in this community." He adds, "Clearly, this club is also not compatible with the residential development taking place here."

If granted a zoning certificate to operate, signage and advertisements on nearby billboards for an adult use would have adverse visual impact. Not only would a strip club repel growth at this location, but it could also create a pocket of stagnancy.

With its nationally recognized brand and reputation, a Scores strip club will attract customers no matter where located. There are many available locations further away from residences, playgrounds and national treasures; any of which would be more suitable for a sexually explicit adult use.

by Mitch Deighan

YEAH! STRIPPERS!!

From today's Daily News:

Dan Gross | 'Scores' of drama

THE FATE of a proposed Scores strip club lies in the hands of the Zoning Board of Adjustment, which next Wednesday will hear an application by Bash Entertainment, operators of Suite 450 (450 N. 6th), for an adult cabaret license. Bash is working with the New York-based strip-club chain, to transform itself into a Scores.

Previous plans from Suite 450 to open a strip club faced opposition from Councilman Frank DiCicco, state Rep. Marie Lederer and a few area civic groups.

We can't imagine the Scores/ Bash case will be helped any by the fact that the chain's co-owner Elliott Osher was arrested in New York last week and charged with first-degree assault for allegedly stabbing repeatedly a former club employee.

Whereas some describe the area where this proposed strip club would be located as "an industrial area" or "a no man's land", others see it as the connecting link between Old City and Northern Liberties.

3/29/06 - Posted from the Daily Record newsroom

Strip club owner pleads guilty in tax case

By SAMUEL MAULL

Associated Press Writer

NEW YORK (AP) -- An owner of the Scores topless clubs and two corporations pleaded guilty today to charges related to filing bogus tax returns.

Richard K. Goldring, of Watchung, N.J., pleaded guilty in Manhattan's state Supreme Court to offering a false instrument for filing. He admitted that in March 2004 he filed a tax return that he knew contained false information.

Goldring was one of three Scores officials indicted in February along with five companies on charges of evading taxes on $3.1 million income. All three officials faced up to four years in prison if they had been convicted after trial.

Under terms of his plea deal, Goldring, part owner of the two Scores clubs in Manhattan, will be required to pay whatever taxes, penalties and fines are demanded by state and federal tax officials and he will be on probation for five years.

Goldring's lawyer, Edward McDonald, said his client will give up ownership of the clubs, but he added that "nothing in the plea agreement prevents him from operating those clubs." He also said Goldring's plea "has no effect on Scores at all."

Prosecutors said customer complaints of overcharges at Scores had led to the investigation and arrests. They said the investigation into overcharges was stymied because the customers were reluctant to cooperate.

Meanwhile, District Attorney Robert Morgenthau said, investigators found "a massive tax evasion scheme by managers and owners of the nightclub."

Morgenthau said the scam, "simple and corrupt," involved the payment of money by Scores to dummy companies as business expenses and the dummy companies' payment of the personal expenses of Goldring and others.

Two companies, DDM Management Corp. and Interactive Business Concepts Inc., pleaded guilty through their lawyer Norman Bloch to filing false state tax returns for 2001. Prosecutors said the companies will be fined $5,000 each. The case of a third company, 333 East 60th Street Inc., was dismissed.

Cheryl Osher, a Scores bookkeeper who signed DDM's tax returns, appeared in court but under terms of an agreement with the Manhattan district attorney's office she did not plead guilty. Instead, her case was adjourned until April 4, 2007.

Bloch said that if Osher, of Brooklyn, lives up to the conditions of the agreement her case will be dismissed next year. He said the principal condition is that she pay whatever taxes that state and federal officials say she owes.

Osher is the niece of defendant Harvey Osher and daughter of Eliot Osher, another owner of the clubs. Eliot Osher was not charged in this case. The clubs are on East 60th Street and West 28th Street.

Harvey Osher, of Matawan, N.J., is expected in court Friday for a resolution of his case and the case of two of the indicted companies.

At least three patrons have sued Scores in the past two years, saying their credit cards were overcharged by tens and even hundreds of thousands of dollars. One patron sued the club after he got a $28,000 bill, and another disputed $129,000 in charges.

The most notorious case involved Robert McCormick, former CEO of St. Louis-based Savvis Inc., who said Scores charged him $241,000 for one night's entertainment after he had run up a tab of about $18,000 to $19,000. A confidential settlement was reached in that case.

I took a look at scoresphiladelphia.info and was shocked to find this comment from Scores management. Looks like a race-based threat againt the community to me:


Do SCORES Philadelphia's opponents, regardless whether they live blocks or miles away, realize that Mr. Hanson could reopen a "hip-hop" club tomorrow at 450 North Sixth Street without any review, community input, etc. Conventional nightclubs, with their patrons who spill out into the streets after closing time are nowhere as safe, and stabilizing, to their neighborhoods as a SCORES Philadelphia will be.

Scores' "hip-hop club vs strip club" ploy is consistent with other allegations their team made at the recent meeting at Seamen's Church Institute. When zoning applicants think they can pull the wool over our eyes (as we experienced at that meeting between the Scores team and members of neighborhood groups), this is a warning sign. And then they create a website to promote "The Truth"?

Personally, I'd rather have a strip club there than a late night dance club rife with drugs and young kids spilling out at 2 or 3 am (whenever clubs close these days).

As for the argument that the industrial zone is a connector between Old City and N. Libs - yes, it is. However, I daresay that not one of you walks through there at the time when the clubs would be open. It's dark, empty and anyone with an ounce of sense doesn't walk through there at night.

The families and tourists that will be going to the Liberty Bell and other sights in Old City will travel during the day. No harm, no foul.

I am not opposed to a strip club at that location. I never hear any noise about Delilah's patrons causing a ruckus when they leave. Does anyone have evidence to the contrary?

David Murphy

I just wonder how many gamblers are going to be traipsing through our neighborhood with their winnings to spend it at the ***** bar...

Action News just did a story about the strip club...