BY SHERRY CONOHAN
Staff Writer
EATONTOWN — Score another victory for the borough in its battle to keep a gentlemen’s club featuring nude dancers from opening in the former Lonestar Steakhouse restaurant on Route 35.
At the Feb. 11 Borough Council meeting, Borough Attorney Gene Anthony reported that the day before, the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia denied the appeal of the building’s owner, 308 Highway 35 Inc., of a lower court ruling barring the club from operating at present.
In a ruling last April, U.S. District Court Judge Anne E. Thompson, sitting in Trenton, denied 308 Highway 35’s request for summary judgment or, in the alternative, for an injunction to block the borough from prohibiting it from proceeding with renovations to the former Lonestar Steakhouse building.
308 Highway 35 is expected to operate as Delilah’s Den if it ever obtains the approvals it needs to open. The site is planned as a juice bar, which would not serve alcohol, but would have nude and seminude dancers.
Anthony said 308 Highway 35 now has two options. It can either go back to U.S. District Court and begin discovery for its case, arguing that a use variance is not needed, or it can seek permission to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.
308 Highway 35 initially filed its litigation in October 2002 and then filed the appeal, which was just denied, last summer, according to Anthony.
The company has argued that the borough is unconstitutionally putting roadblocks in front of the business to prevent it from opening at the restaurant site. Anthony has said that unless the business going into the former Lonestar Steakhouse was a family-style restaurant like its predecessor, it would need a variance.
The building in which the Lonestar Steakhouse was located is on Route 35 south, across from Capitol Lighting and south of Monmouth Mall.