By SCOTT SMITH
Tribune staff writer
January 26, 2006 11:42 pm
—
Master Lar and Miss Kitty may have worked for months to build a sado-masochistic “dungeon” in Kokomo, but their dream of opening a spanking club on South Main Street appears to have ended.
City planning officials said Thursday they received assurances last week from Kathy King, who calls herself Miss Kitty, that the club won’t open. Her husband, Larry, known as Master Lar, did not attend the meeting.
The couple has been under pressure from city officials, the public and members of their own Kokomo Kinksters bondage, domination and sado-masochism club since making their spanking club plans public in a Jan. 10 interview with the Kokomo Tribune.
During the interview, the Kings led a tour of a 5,000-square-foot former warehouse space, which they’d converted into a mock medieval dungeon, complete with numerous pillory-like stands where an individual could be restrained and whipped.
Racks containing leather flogs, riding crops and wooden paddles had been bolted to the walls.
The two BDSM devotees said they were hoping the public would tolerate a members-only spanking club, as long as it was kept discreet.
The couple said the Kinksters, linked through the Internet, has 181 members and is growing, and they thought it was time to bring their lifestyle out of the closet.
“We want a safe place for the people in this lifestyle to meet discreetly,” Kathy King said. “In this place, they’ll know nothing will happen they don’t want to have happen.”
Once planning officials learned of the dungeon’s location, doubts were immediately raised about the propriety of a sexually oriented business so close to a residential neighborhoods and a church.
Kathy King learned some bad news last Friday. City planners Jim Hunter and Jim Carter had plotted out the distance between the King’s dungeon and several “sensitive uses” on an aerial photo. According to both planners, the dungeon was in violation of the city’s zoning ordinance.
The ordinance states a sexually oriented business may not operate within 500 feet of a church, school, residential neighborhood or another sexually oriented business.
According to the aerial map, the dungeon is too close to a neighborhood, a church and another sexually oriented business — a strip club, Kokomo-Howard County Plan Commission Director Glen Boise said Thursday.
In the Jan. 10 interview, the Kings said they didn’t want their club compared to local strip clubs, although Larry King acknowledged there was a small measure of sexuality in the club’s activities.
The club’s written rules, which the Kings gave to the Tribune, forbid alcohol, drugs, nudity (other than bared buttocks) and any kind of sexual activity. Club functions were to be through members only.
Those seeking membership would be individually screened and subjected to criminal background checks to ensure they had no history of violent behavior. The Kings said nothing on the outside of the building would indicate that a spanking club was operating inside
“We’re nothing like a bar. Number one, it’s a private membership. Our doors aren’t open to the public,” Kathy King said. “[The bars are] not a lifestyle, they’re just an outlet. We provide a safe haven for people in our lifestyle. We know what’s going on before somebody plays. We have dungeon masters to monitor everything in the play room.”
Since the Tribune interview, both phone numbers listed on Master Lar’s Yahoo! Web site have been blocked; a message tells callers that calls are no longer being accepted. Attempts to contact the couple at the dungeon also were unsuccessful Thursday.
Larry King did, however, express his disappointment with the publicity the club received on his Web site, posting Jan. 17 “It is sad when you have to fight a battle on 2 sides.”
A response to that post, from a Kinksters member with the username “HM,” criticized the Kings for talking with the media and giving out the operating hours of the club. According to King’s Web site, the club was open Saturdays, from 8 p.m. until the last person left.
Boise said Kathy King denied the club had ever been open for business and gatherings were limited to a few friends meeting on several occasions.
He also said Kathy King raised the possibility she and her husband might try to receive city approval for some type of retail business at the location.
MASTER LAR POSTS ON HIS YAHOO! WEB SITE:
• Entry for Jan. 17
It is sad when you have to fight a battle front on 2 sides one with your peers and the other is to fight for our right to live the way we want to. Then having your trust thrown around like it don’t mean anything. What is this world coming to.
• Entry for Nov. 24
It’s been fun working down at the dungeon planning and looking for the right spot for each and every piece of equipment. Found some 100 year old poplar wood out of an old barn for a dungeon door also a close friend of mine is a blacksmith and he’s making the hinges. The dungeon is in a 100 yearold + factory buliding it was the first factory to make the first tubeless tire right here in Kokomo. The part we have is 10,000 sq. ft. so we decided to open up a dungeon for all to come to. It has hard wood floors with lots of old wood beams. The main play area is 5,000 sq ft and we are planning to put in 3 private play rooms. They will house a school room a Medical play room as well a smaller private dungeon. Plus we will have 2 areas for aftercare ... The theme of the dungeon is the look and feel of a real old world dungeon. For now we are only open every saturday from 8 p.m. to ?? or till the last person leaves. LOL
Giving an interview: bad. Releasing a statement: would have been better.
Inviting press to a function WITHOUT clearing it with members: bad
Giving out club address and hours of operation: bad
Club is good idea, but with most everyone wondering if you can be trusted is bad. They won’t come. No one know who might be sitting out there with a telephoto lens or outside on public property looking at who ever is going inside.
People are going to be leary now. There is such a thing as too much information.
Still, if the brouhaha dies down, it may just be ignored.
Posted by HM, Jan. 18
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