Pacifica, CA Business Licensing & Operations: Adult Entertainment (2026)

In the City of Pacifica, adult businesses cannot operate as a matter of right anywhere in the city. 2314 confines them to the Commercial (C) zoning districts and conditions every location on obtaining a discretionary use permit through the process set out in Article 33 of Chapter 4, Title 9 of the code. Before the Planning Commission can approve that permit, the parcel must clear a minimum 500-foot separation from seven listed categories: any residential zoning district, any residential use regardless of the underlying zone, any other adult business, a school primarily attended by minors, a church, a public beach, and a public park.

Because Pacifica is a small coastal city with residential neighborhoods, churches, schools and public beaches threaded through its commercial corridors, the 500-foot rule functions as a citywide dispersal requirement rather than a limit affecting only a few sites. The Planning Department reviews the use permit application, and the Planning Commission holds the noticed public hearing required by Article 33 before granting, conditioning, or denying it. There is no ministerial path around the permit: an adult business that opens without one, or that operates within the 500-foot buffer, is treated as a zoning violation subject to code enforcement rather than a routine business-licensing issue.