A barista brouhaha

YAKIMA, Wash. -- A battle may be brewing over the growing proliferation of espresso stands in Yakima where the way baristas are dressed is as much a draw as the coffee they serve.

Mayor Dave Edler says he wants the city's legal staff to see if there's anything that can be done about the businesses often referred to as bikini bars or sexpresso stands, including one on Yakima Avenue in the heart of downtown.

Repeating a story he told the City Council on Tuesday, Edler told the Herald-Republic he recently got an eyeful while passing by the Dream Girls Espresso bar on Yakima Avenue, near the First Avenue intersection.

He said a female employee was standing outside the business wearing skimpy apparel he described as either a "nightie or a teddie."

"I'm really not sure what you call it," he joked. "All I know is that I'm thinking, 'This is Yakima Avenue.' It just didn't seem right to me. If I were dressed like that, I'd get arrested."

Council members were in agreement, hoping to see some research done on the issue.

Edler's foster son, Cesar Dominguez, a pastor at Franklin Hill Foursquare Church, told the City Council of a similar encounter he had a month ago while driving downtown with his 12-year-old daughter, Sadie, and 9-year-old son, Mason.

In a follow-up interview Wednesday, he repeated the details: That a Dream Girls employee was waving a sign at passing traffic offering Krispy Kreme donuts for sale -- and that she was wearing next to nothing.

"There was a lot of skin, that's for sure," he said, adding, "We had our little show right there."

The way Edler and Dominguez see it, bikini bars are selling a bit more than sex appeal and should come under purview of the city's new Adult Business Ordinance. There are believed to be two such businesses in Yakima and two in Union Gap.

"If they were selling magazines, they would be regulated as an adult bookstore," Dominguez said. "They're exploiting a little bit of a loophole in the ordinance."

The ordinance prohibits stores that sell pornographic videos, books, sex toys and other novelties from being located within 500 feet of schools, churches, public parks and residential areas.

It also restricts such businesses from being located within 1,500 feet of a similar store, and has further restrictions on signage and hours of operation.

"I want to start moving us toward action," Edler said, adding that he's been getting complaints from the public as well as the downtown Westside Merchants business group.

A well-tanned Dream Girls employee said Wednesday she was prohibited as a company policy from talking about her job.

Wearing high heels, sheer-mesh boy shorts and a sequined bikini top, she was busy serving two men at a walkup window and the driver of a big pickup in the drive-thru.

"Sorry, we're not allowed to talk to you guys," she said cheerfully.

In an interview later Wednesday afternoon, her boss said employees are not supposed to step outside the stand while dressed "in costume" and that any sightings to the contrary came at best during a one-time-only Krispy Kreme fundraiser.

Cheryl Clark, who also owns the more modest Mocha Tree espresso stand on Nob Hill Boulevard, defended her operation as an expression of American principles.

"I realize where Mayor Edler is coming from, his being a pastor," she said. "But on the other hand, there's a lot of people that don't mind it. I would say there's more that don't than do. It's a personal choice. Nobody's forcing these people to go."

As for talk of a crackdown on bikini bars, she figures Dream Girls would be grandfathered in for legal reasons the same way two adult-video stores were grandfathered in when the city recently adopted the new Adult Business Ordinance.

In that sense, she and the other existing stands would have the market cornered.

"Pretty much," she said, concluding, "That would be great."

* Chris Bristol can be reached at 577-7748 or cbristol@yakimaherald.com.