Ankeny, IA Business Licensing & Operations: Adult Entertainment (2026)

Ankeny Code of Ordinances Chapter 140 regulates adult arcades, bookstores, cabarets, motels, theaters, escort agencies, nude model studios and sexual encounter centers. Section 140.04 makes it unlawful to operate without a City Council permit, requiring a scaled floor-plan sketch, inspection by the Health Department, Fire Department, Building Official and Zoning Official, signatures from every owner with a 10% or greater interest, and a sworn statement that the applicant has no disqualifying sex-offense, prostitution, controlled-substance or related conviction within the past two to ten years depending on severity.

The Police Chief must approve or deny a permit within 30 days (§ 140.05), and fees, inspection, expiration, suspension, revocation and transfer are separately addressed in §§ 140.06-140.11. Section 140.12 confines these businesses to C-3 zoned commercial districts and bars them within 1,000 feet, measured in a straight line without regard to intervening structures, of a church or place of worship, a public or private school, a residential district boundary, a public park, a licensed day-care center, or another sexually oriented business; two such businesses also cannot share a building.

A business lawfully operating before the ordinance's effective date but out of compliance becomes a nonconforming use allowed to continue for up to two years unless discontinued 30 or more days (§ 140.13), and persons under 18 are barred from the premises entirely (§ 140.18).