City may draw handbill line

A chorus of wedding chapel voices is calling on the city of Las Vegas to kick handbillers off the corner outside the downtown marriage license office, a course that could take the city into unconstitutional waters.

City officials are already considering a 100-foot buffer zone to give marrying couples some respite from those who try to entice them with budget ceremonies and waiting limousines. Depending on how the lines are drawn, that zone could create constitutional headaches as well.

But some members of the struggling chapel industry say bad press and word-of-mouth about incidents at the Regional Justice Center do as much damage to their bottom lines as a sluggish economy, high gasoline prices and competition from other resort destinations.

"I think it really, really has," said Linda Swift-Moulton, who owns the LaBella Wedding Chapel in the Las Vegas Hilton. "Word does get around."

Though the Hilton is not inside the Las Vegas city limits, clients must go downtown to get a marriage license, and they often are shocked when they get back, Swift-Moulton said.

"They say, 'It's a circus down there. It's a joke.' How the handbillers just get right in their face, grab them by the arm. ... They go back and tell their friends that."

Not everyone has that view of handbilling. Joan Bojorquez of the Vegas Adventure Wedding Chapel says it fills a need for couples who don't book ahead of time.

"When they're at the courthouse and they're given a brochure ... they can chapel shop," she said. "They can go look and make a decision. They appreciate the fact that someone is guiding them along."

Last year, the City Council revoked the license of the Las Vegas Garden of Love chapel, which was blamed for many of the worst hypercompetitive behaviors at the license office.

Now, the council is looking at two reforms to chapel regulation: the 100-foot handbilling setback and requiring new chapel owners to go through a background check, just as the owners of strip clubs and liquor stores do.

Comments on the proposal focus almost exclusively on the 100-foot buffer zone, which would start at the doors to the marriage bureau.

As several people pointed out, that essentially would leave the handbillers on the same slice of sidewalk they use now.

"There are several steps and a large patio area between the public entrance and the sidewalk," wrote Clark County Clerk Shirley Parraguirre, whose office oversees the marriage bureau. "These steps and connected patio make up most of the 100 feet in any direction."

Parraguirre suggested having the zone start at the sidewalk, which would force the handbillers across the street.

That doesn't go far enough for others, who say handbilling has given the city a "black eye" and needs to be abolished.

"The ordinance should state that no one is allowed to pass out brochures," wrote the Rev. Laki Kaahumanu, who performs weddings at the Little White Chapel.

"Let's eliminate the panhandlers as unwanted trash that seem to litter our streets with tasteless tactics of advertisement."

The problem with both of those ideas is that they run smack into the First Amendment, according to the American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada.

"They have a right to be out there," said Allen Lichtenstein, the ACLU's general counsel, of the handbillers. "Any number of things can be passed out. It is clearly a public sidewalk. It is a public forum."

Problems that have been reported at the courthouse are "insufficient justification" for trying to restrict anyone's freedom of speech, he said.

"Really, there are people who are not following the rules. That's an enforcement issue," Lichtenstein said. "Keep them from harassing people or blocking people. That's about all they can do."

The city attorney's office was not available to comment on possible revisions to the proposed ordinance.

Conflicts over who can pass out what in which location are nothing new in the Las Vegas Valley, and the outcomes of past legal battles have favored the leafleters, handbillers and protesters.

In 1999, The Venetian wanted union picketers arrested for trespassing, noting that the sidewalk they were using is privately owned.

The courts didn't buy it, though, ruling that since the sidewalks function as a public thoroughfare, they're public forums.

Two years earlier, Las Vegas and the Fremont Street Experience tried banning leafleting and proselytizing under the giant canopy downtown, but lost a court challenge.

About a year ago, Clark County lost a 10-year legal battle over restrictions on handbilling on the Strip, a measure aimed at prohibiting the "exotic dancer" ads that are waved at tourists.

Bojorquez said she's hoping for positive buzz about the Las Vegas chapel industry, one that's likely to continue to have handbillers, no matter what the restrictions end up being.

"If they move us out 100 feet, we'll be at 100 feet," she said. "Wherever the City Council tells us we're going to be, that's where we'll be."

Contact reporter Alan Choate at achoate @reviewjournal.com or (702) 229-6435.