Tokyo Valentino Owner Promises To Fight Cobb Sex Shop Limits

COBB COUNTY, GA — The owner of a recently opened sex shop in East Cobb promised to fight a revised county ordinance intended to further restrict businesses like his.

Cobb County’s Board of Commissioners voted unanimously Tuesday to broaden the definition of sex shops and further limit where they can operate by amending the existing ordinance governing them, according to The Marietta Daily-Journal.

“We existed before that ordinance, and if they’ve crafted something purely to drive us out, there’s going to be a grandfather argument for that,” said Michael Morrison, owner of Tokyo Valentino, to the Marietta newspaper.

Tokyo Valentino is an Atlanta-based chain of sex stores that’s seen its share of controversy in Cobb County.

Just as Morrison opened a new location in June on Johnson Ferry Road — initially presenting it as a clothing store when he applied for a business license — another location on Cobb Parkway had its license pulled for selling too much sex-related merchandise.

Both locations are still open for business, with the Johnson Ferry location “doing well,” according to Morrison.

When neighbors learned of the Johnson Ferry Road location, they mounted on online petition against it that as of Thursday has drawn nearly 3,000 signatures. That petition led to Cobb County Commissioner Bob Ott pushing to amend the existing ordinance.

The revised Cobb County ordinance defines sex shops as having at least 500 square feet devoted to items depicting “specified sexual activities or specified anatomical areas.” It also considers any store with more than 100 “sexual devices” to be a sex shop.

The revisions also require sex shops to be at least 1,500 feet — the length of five football fields — away from schools, churches, government buildings, parks, hospitals, prisons, libraries and residential areas.

Existing shops that are too close to restricted areas will have until the end of 2021 to move. They can also apply for a hardship extension of one extra year.

Morrison said to The Marietta Daily-Journal that enforcing the changes could lead to court.

“There are things we would litigate out in court,” Morrison told the Marietta newspaper. “We’ve had a lot of success doing this over the past 27 years.”