Allegany County, MD Business Licensing & Operations: Adult Entertainment (2026)

Allegany County's zoning code funnels every adult use into a single commercial zone. Under Allegany County Code § 360-114, the Board of Appeals may grant a special exception for an adult use only in the B-2 Major Commercial District; no other district qualifies. The zoning code's ADULT USE definition sweeps in adult bookstores, adult live entertainment, adult theaters and massage parlors, meaning a massage business meeting that definition is treated as an adult use rather than licensed under any separate county ordinance. Before the Board can approve the special exception, the site must clear locational buffers: 1,000 lineal feet from the lot line of any library, public park, other public recreational area or residential district, and 1,500 lineal feet from any primary or secondary school, child day-care center, church or similar place of worship, or existing dwelling unit, both measured regardless of municipal boundaries.

The property also needs a thirty-foot-wide evergreen screening buffer, or a fence or wall tall and solid enough to block the use from neighboring properties, along its side and rear lot lines. Operational conditions follow site approval: no pornographic material, display or word may be visible from outside the establishment, no activity may violate federal, state or county criminal law, and an adult use cannot be combined with the sale or consumption of alcoholic beverages. Private viewing booths are prohibited outright on public-health grounds. Applicants must disclose the full legal name and home address of every owner and name an on-site manager personally responsible for daily compliance, reporting any ownership change to the Zoning Administrator in writing within seven days.

Finally, § 360-114G shuts every adult use down overnight: no operation is permitted between 11:00 p.m. and 8:00 a.m., a stricter curfew than applies to other B-2 commercial uses.