Transcripts

[SHOUTING] MIKE MULCAHY: About two dozen sign carrying protesters marched in the street in front of the home of Jim Hafiz in Woodbury, just East of Saint Paul. Hafiz manages the Fox Theater in Saint Paul for its Michigan-based owners.

Mike Laughlin owns three businesses on the West End of University Avenue, near where the Faust is planning to move. He says he and other residents wanted Hafiz to share their discomfort.

MIKE LAUGHLIN: If he can move his business up and ruin our business, we can just disrupt his afternoon, maybe a little bit, and bring it home. Hafiz and his family gave little sign they even noticed the protest. They declined to speak with demonstrators or the press. But a next door neighbor, Mike Gali, didn't hide his feelings.

MIKE GALI: They have no business interrupting a peaceful neighborhood. If they want to take it up and-- if they want to take up the problem in front of the person's business, that's fine. But get out of my neighborhood.

MIKE MULCAHY: Gali was unsuccessful in getting the protesters to leave. He and some others on the block say the Hafizs are good neighbors and nice people. Protester William Lawrence says that may be, but Lawrence thinks Hafiz is trying to ruin the neighborhood around Saint Paul's Merriam Park by moving in the Faust.

WILLIAM LAWRENCE: We don't want Mr. Hafiz any place on University Avenue in Saint Paul. We don't want him any place. We'd love to see him out of town, someplace in the woods, someplace and a garage with drawing windows. That's where we love to have him operate his business, but not in Saint Paul, where he can do a tremendous amount of damage.

The Faust announced it was buying a new building last month after the city of Saint Paul went to court to acquire the property where the theater now stands. Neighbors around the new building have taken over from those around the original location, who protested the theater's existence for years.

The neighbors want city officials, notably Mayor George Latimer, to be more aggressive in fighting pornography. Latimer was out of town yesterday when the protesters went to his house. A lawyer for the Faust, Leland Frankman, says protests by neighbors haven't hurt the theater in the past and probably won't hurt it this time.

He says if the residents pressure politicians into closing the Faust, he may seek damages for loss of business or, in legal terms, loss of going concern value. He says that may be more than the city is willing to pay.

LELAND FRANKMAN: It may benefit various political people to say we're going to stop this. We're going to put these people out of business. OK, and encourage and participate in demonstrations. But I'm not sure when it comes time to seeing what my case is, which they haven't seen yet and which hasn't been fully put together, when the time comes to see how much that's going to cost them to do that, I'm not so sure that they'll feel they were wise in the first place.

MIKE MULCAHY: Attorney Leland Frankman represents the Faust Theater. The Faust is scheduled to close a deal on its new building March 31st. I'm Mike Mulcahy.