The former Golden State, now the Rusty Iron State, and why I call it Kookfornia. Why would any voter in his or her right mind even give a flying fuck whether porn actors used condoms or not? Only in Kookfornia would you find 372,000 kooks who signed a petition to put that measure on the November ballot.
MANDATORY CONDOM USE ON PORN SET IS ON NOVEMBER 6 BALLOT
By Christina Villacorte
Los Angeles Daily News
July 24, 2012
For the first time ever, voters will be asked to decide whether porn stars should be mandated by law to wear condoms while filming.
The county Board of Supervisors on Tuesday voted 3-1, with one abstention, to place a measure on the Nov. 6 ballot requiring porn stars to use condoms during the production of adult films in Los Angeles County.
It would also require adult entertainment producers to undergo training on blood-borne pathogens, submit an exposure control plan and obtain a public health permit.
The board's unprecedented move came after officials of the nonprofit AIDS Healthcare Foundation submitted 372,000 petition signatures - far more than required to place a measure on the ballot.
The porn industry, however, threatened to take legal action to block the proposed regulations, arguing that requiring them to use condoms in their movies violates their right to free speech. They also said the multi-billion-dollar industry, based primarily in the San Fernando Valley, would be driven out of the region by the measure.
Diane Duke, executive director of the Free Speech Coalition, a trade association of adult entertainment businesses, said porn stars have a lower risk of contracting sexually transmitted diseases than the rest of the population.
"Our population is tested much more frequently than anybody else," she said. "People who are walking around with HIV and don't even know it - you're not going to find that in our industry.”
Duke said a county report showed that of the 6,500 new HIV infections between June 2008 and June 2011, none were contracted from an adult film set.
She added that protocols already in place enabled the industry to quickly identify two porn stars who had contracted HIV off-set, and prevented them from performing again.
Allan Gelbard, a lawyer for the adult film industry, called the ballot measure "an unconstitutional and unwise attempt to fix a nonexistent problem."
He also warned that the proposed regulations may drive the multi-billion dollar industry away from the county. Its hub is the San Fernando Valley.
But Stephen Kaufman, lawyer for the AIDS Healthcare Foundation, disputed claims the ballot measure would trample on the First Amendment.
"The focus of this measure is on the health and safety of the performers in that workplace," he said.
Mark McGrath, a public health consultant for the AIDS Healthcare Foundation, stressed, "It is unfair that adult film performers should be asked to take their health and life at risk to earn a meager living."
Supervisors Zev Yaroslavsky, Michael Antonovich and Don Knabe voted to place the measure on the ballot, while Mark Ridley-Thomas abstained.
Supervisor Gloria Molina cast the lone dissenting vote, expressing concern it would lead to the county taking over responsibilities that properly belong to the state Division of Occupational Safety and Health, better known as Cal/OSHA.
She worried it could open the county to lawsuits from porn stars who contract sexually transmitted diseases while performing at an adult film set with a county public health permit.
"I just don't understand why we're taking away the workplace responsibilities of Cal/OSHA and inheriting all the liability that goes along with it," Molina said.
Kaufman, however, pointed out the board's hands were tied. Under the election code, it had only two choices - to enact the ordinance sought by the petition, or to submit the matter to voters.
The failure to do either would "thwart the will of the (more than) 371,000 voters who signed the petition and the voters of the county who will be presented with this matter for consideration in November."
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