The STOPLight

A community takes action

The sex industry is very powerful and has often not been challenged as it claims a place in our communities and our lives. Often, the media and powerful, influential people help it right along. We see that communities and citizens need to speak out about what is happening -- the damage that is being done to people.

Several organizations in the Twin Cities area are taking positive action to reduce and eliminate commercial sexual exploitation. Following are brief profiles of three. We invite you to submit an article (200-400 words) about what your organization is doing on this issue. Your work may inspire and teach others!

Media Action Alliance is an all-volunteer organization working to change the negative and harmful ways that women are portrayed in the media in order to end the epidemic of battering and sexual violence. Our goal is to empower people to make a difference by providing them with the awareness and tools needed to challenge harmful media sexism and violence. On-going campaigns include protesting Twin Cities area newspapers and tour guides that advertise for strip joints; the Sports illustrated swimsuit issue; Calvin Klein ads, and Hooters restaurants.

We make video and slide presentations to various groups and publish a quarterly newsletter, the Action Agenda. It includes convenient action postcards and other information people can use to voice their concerns to the media or send applause when they do something right.

To subscribe, send a check for $15 to: Media Action Alliance, P0 Box 391, Circle Pines, MN 55014-0391.

University Avenue Prostitution Task Force is a coalition of businesses, citizens, and the police that formed to tackle the problem of street prostitution. Business owners and residents felt that prostitution hurt businesses and brought drugs, gangs, and unwanted traffic into the area.

Since our initial formation, we have narrowed our focus to closing a "health spa," which, not coincidentally, was St. Paul's leading spot for prostitution complaints in 1994.

We work in collaboration with the St. Paul Police Department vice unit that is vital to our progress. They advised the following actions for closing this neighborhood nuisance:

• Hold a vigil (3-5 people at all times) for several days, 24 hours a day, outside this business.
• Take photos of all customers entering the building.
• Have police interview customers exiting the building to seek confession statements, on the grounds that the business has a past history of prostitution-related incidents ("confess now or be charged to the fullest later"). Once the police have three to five confessions, they can proceed with formally shutting down the business. The vice unit is committing officers to the project so there will be a police presence 12 to 14 hours a day.

We haven't held the vigil yet, but are working from other angles. We are picketing the building owner's home and place of employment. We have also learned that the attorney representing all the "health spas" in St. Paul, including this one, is one of the leaders of the city planning commission. For more information, contact:

Michael Darger, University UNITED, 1600 University Avenue, Suite #4, St. Paul, MN 55104, (612) 647-6711.

Skyway Business and Professional Women formed a Commercial Sex Industry Task Force in 1994 to address the proliferation of adult entertainment in the downtown Minneapolis area. It's objective is that there will be no additional adult entertainment establishments permitted downtown. We have a five-year plan in place to combat the commercial sex industry. Thus far, we have done the following: held three symposiums on the personal, business, political, and legal aspects of the commercial sex industry; began letter-writing campaigns; and sponsored IMPACT self-defense and empowerment training. Our future plans include working with a playwright to produce a play about the commercial sex industry; planning a silent witness march down the Nicollet Mall; and conducting classes for mothers and sons to teach respect for women.

We collaborate with other organizations to gain strength and to educate our members. We are trying to gain publicity from the media in order to get our message to the public.

For more information or for a subscription to our newsletter ($12 for 12 issues), please contact: Susan Lehrer (612-334-5600) or Gretchen Crowley (612-376-9242), Skyway Business and Professional Women, P0 Box 2715, Minneapolis, MN 55402.