Seal Beach will be getting its first tattoo studio soon.
The Seal Beach Planning Commission approved a conditional use permit for a tattoo studio on Pacific Coast Highway on Wednesday, Aug. 17. Planners voted 3-1 in favor of granting the permit. New District 3 Commissioner Robert Goldberg cast the dissenting vote. District 2 Commissioner Esther Cummings was absent.
The staff report recommended that the commission approve the CUP.
Senior Planner Jerry Olivera presented the staff report, which he wrote, to the commission. Olivera said the Zoning Code did not originally mention tattoo businesses in Seal Beach. “As tattoo art has become more prevalent within mainstream society in recent years, a provision was added to Title 11 to allow tattoo studios as a conditionally permitted use within the General Commercial Zone,” Olivera wrote.
According to the report, The Ninth Circuit of the U.S. Court of Appeals ruled in September 2010 that tattoos are a form of free speech protected by the First Amendment of the Constitution.
Olivera told the planners that cities cannot ban tattoo parlor entirely.
The ruling was the result of a challenge to a Hermosa Beach ordinance that prohibited tattoo studios.
“This ruling does not, however, preclude cities from implementing reasonable zoning restrictions such as a conditional use permit requirement,” Olivera wrote.
The studio would be located at 1500-F Pacific Coast Highway, in Old Town Seal Beach.
Olivera said Capt. Tim Olson, second in command of the Seal Beach Police Department, told planning staff that police had no objection to a tattoo studio.
Applicant Timothy Shelton, a seven-year Seal Beach resident, said he was trained as an artist and had worked professionally as a graphic artist. He said he currently works as an employee of two tattoo studios.
Shelton said he believed a tattoo shop would benefit Seal Beach. He said there was a bar and a chiropractic business at the location.
He said the business would have two or three employees and would not have much signage as the studio would not be what he called “a big walk-in business.”
Goldberg asked Shelton if he’d had any professional complaints filed against himself.
Shelton said he did not.
Fellow Seal Beach resident Barbara Barton was apparently not happy about the permit application. She said she wanted to know how neighbors felt about a tattoo parlor. She also asked if the owners would be able to sell the permit if the permit were approved.
“The permit goes with the business,” said Sandra Massa-Lavitt, Planning Commission chair.
Local activist Mike Buhbe supported the application. He said he was not a big fan of tattoos personally, but he loved the creativity shown in their creation.
The owners of Beachwood BBQ and 320 Main restaurants spoke in favor of Shelton’s request for a permit to open his tattoo studio.
Massa-Lavitt said most of the e-mails the city had received were against the tattoo parlor. She did not specify how many were received.
Only one e-mail was in the agenda package that was available online at the city of Seal Beach Web site. That e-mail was written by Peggy Morrison to District 1 Councilwoman Ellery Deaton.
“Will this business serve the needs of the residents of Seal Beach: No,” Morrison wrote. “Does it fit the business mix in Old Town: No. There are tattoo studios in Sunset Beach and Long Beach. Anyone wishing a tattoo can patronize those places. If this CUP is granted, I suggest a three-month period to re-evaluate.”
Goldberg asked if it was true that the only way to deny the application was to find it was not compatible with the location.
Assistant City Attorney Steve Flower said tattoos were protected by the First Amendment.
Olivera said the city code had extensive requirements for tattoo businesses: neon signage would not be allowed, tattoo artists would have to be registered with the county, and the city would have to be notified if the business ownership changed.
Goldberg said he had heard from about a half dozen people in District 3. “The problem is that tattoo studios have a bad reputation,” he said. Goldberg said maybe that reputation was not deserved, but it existed.
He said the people who contacted him were concerned that the tattoo parlor was not consistent with Seal Beach’s small town charm. He said Pacific Coast Highway and Main Street were the face of Seal Beach. Goldberg said a tattoo studio at that location might not be consistent with a small town.
“I’m going to vote against this,” Goldberg said.
District 1 Commissioner David Everson said he didn’t have any tattoos himself, but he lived above a tattoo studio in Newport Beach when he first came to California. He was not opposed to the tattoo studio on the basis of image.
“I think the image of this town is the eclectic nature of it,” he said.
Commissioner Jerry Galbreath also said he had no problem with the location of the business. “You’re not going to drive by and see it,” he said.
Galbreath was apparently referring to the fact that the studio would be on the second floor of a multi-unit commercial building.
Massa-Lavitt said Pacific Coast Highway was the most appropriate place for the business in Old Town. She said she thought it would have minimum impact.
The commissioners cast their votes. When the CUP was approved, there was a loud round of applause from the audience.
