It’s difficult to miss the bright red letters spelling “Hustler” when driving by the new West Covina store, located just off the 10 Freeway on Sunset Avenue.
But while some residents struggle to explain what the word means to their children and what the sex shop, Hustler Hollywood, sells, there’s isn’t much recourse for neighbors.
“Cities don’t have the ability to dictate what businesses come into a community if they don’t need any discretionary approvals,” said West Covina City Manager Chris Freeland, acknowledging the concern expressed by some that the name of the store itself presents an unwanted image for the residential neighborhood. “It is difficult for the city to accept to a certain degree, too.”
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Since opening the company’s 15th location in the San Gabriel Valley city last week, Philip Del Rio, vice president of retail for Hustler Hollywood Stores, said the feedback from customers has been positive and no disgruntled residents have approached management about their concerns.
“Business is good so far,” Del Rio said. “We’ve had quite a lot of visitors from the local community and we’ve had nobody complain, no picketers, nobody really causing an issue at all.”
The shop, which sells lingerie along with sex toys and adult entertainment, is considered a retail business under city code because less than 25 percent of the retail space is devoted to adult-themed items.
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And since it is a relatively small business that took over an existing retail establishment it did not need to complete any sort of traffic or environmental impact studies that a large development project would require, Freeland said.
If the store was classified as an adult business it would not be able to locate in the same space because of its proximity to residential homes. Unless the store violates the 25 percent requirement, the city would not be able to ask the business to relocate.
Short of boycotting the business, some residents said they didn’t plan to retaliate in any way despite a deep-seated aversion to the shop.
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“The best that we can do is probably go to city hall and check up on the people that are supposed to (ensure code compliance),” said resident Paul Ayala, who started an online petition urging the city to keep the store out of town. “We’ll probably just leave it at that.”
Resident Ernesto Garcia, a father of two girls ages 9 and 10, echoed Ayala’s sentiment, adding that the uproar in the immediate neighborhood has since “fizzled out.”
“The sign’s up. They’ve had their soft opening,” said Garcia, adding that he would not be shopping at the business or allowing his children to walk by it to get to the Plaza West Covina mall across the freeway. “It’s not going to be something that we’re going to do anything about.”