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Specific comments made by businesspersons included the following: <br />My clients don't like to come to my office and have to go by these stores. The <br />storefronts also lower my image as a business which is very detrimental to me. <br />- publishing consultant <br />There is a )M store on the next block. We work until 8:00 P.M. Mon. - <br />Thurs. and it is scary to walk past the seedy element that hangs out there. <br />- retail furniture store <br />Impacts Identified at the Public Hearing of The Task Force on the <br />Regulation of Sex -Related Businesses <br />The Task Force on the Regulation of Sex -Related Businesses was established in 1993 by the <br />Borough President of Manhattan, Ruth W. Messinger, in response to community concerns <br />about increasing concentrations of sex-related businesses. <br />The Task Force conducted a public hearing on October 6, 1993, at which more than 20 <br />people testified. Approximately twice as many individuals testified in favor of regulating adult <br />entertainment establishments as those opposed to government regulation of adult uses. Those <br />speaking in favor of regulation discussed adult establishments in various neighborhoods in <br />Manhattan: Tribeca and Downtown Manhattan, Chelsea,. East Harlem, Times Square, and the <br />East Side; the majority spoke of Times Square and Chelsea. <br />The Task Force structured the hearing as a fact-finding hearing to obtain testimony about how <br />adult uses impact residents, businesses and Manhattan neighborhoods. The impacts identified <br />by the testimony are summarized below, and a copy of the transcript of the public hearing <br />is available for review at DCP. <br />Crime, including drugs and prostitution, was the most frequently cited impact from adult <br />establishments. For example, the President of the 42nd Street Development Project, referring <br />to a concentration of sex-related uses on 42nd Street between 7th and 8th Avenues, cited a <br />60 percent drop in crime after the Project took title to two-thirds of the project area in April <br />1990 and a majority of the site was cleared.59 <br />59 The transcript of the testimony, at pages 1 10 through 116, is instructive of the effects of the concentration <br />of adult uses. <br />39 EVER00138 <br />