2005/06/15 Council Agenda Packet

The analysis of criminal complaint data and property assessed valuation. data was less conclusive than the surveys. Regarding criminal complaints, it appears that land uses other than adult entertainment establishments, e.g., subway station access, have a far stronger relationship to criminal complaints. It was not possible to isolate the impact of adult uses relative to criminal complaints. One reason is that data was collected for the limited purpose of identifying differences between survey and control blockfronts within each study area, not between or among study areas. Differences in the number of complaints between or among study areas may be a function of variations in population densities, or -other factors for which no study controls were established. Additionally, data was gathered for a single period of time, not for trend analysis. Comparisons of percentage changes in assessed valuations between 1986 to 1992 for the study areas, survey and control blockfronts, community district, and borough, did not reveal any significant relat -.nship. It would ^ ppear that the negative impacts of adult entertainment uses on property values that were found in other studies were overwhelmed by forces that increased property values overall, at least as measured by assessed values. DCP found that demonstrating the effects of adult uses on property values on survey blockfronts is very difficult for several reasons, including the lack of sales and lease data, assessment practices, and the small total .assessed value of the survey .blockfront relative to the community district. In some cases, particularly in study areas with only one adult entertainment establishment, the DCP survey did not yield conclusive evidence of a direct relationship between the adult use and the urban ills affecting the community. This reflects the fact that, in a city as dense and diverse as New York, it is difficult to isolate specific impacts attributable to any particular land use. Other cities that have conducted similar studies have acknowledged this same difficulty. For instance, the Los Angeles City Planning Department concluded that while assessed valuation of properties in areas characterized by adult uses "generally" tended to increase to a lesser degree than similar control areas, "there was insufficient evidence to support the contention that concentrations of sex-related businesses have been the primary cause of these patterns". Adult entertainment businesses were nevertheless perceived by the majority of the Los Angeles respondents as exerting a negative impact on surrounding business and residential properties. Whether or not such negative impacts had actually occurred, or were only perceived to have occurred, could not always be determined by the survey, but the study concluded that "in terms of the attitudes of the respondents towards such businesses, the conclusion must be drawn that the overall effect on surrounding properties is considered to be negative." 65 EV ER00163