Palatine, IL Business Licensing & Operations: Adult Entertainment (2026)

Village Code § 22-144 sits in chapter 22's Article V, 'Offenses Involving Morals,' and lets an adult bookstore or adult movie theater operate in the Village of Palatine only as a special use inside a B-5 Highway Business District, never as a matter of right. Layered onto that zoning restriction are five separate distance buffers written directly into the section: 1,000 feet from any other adult bookstore or adult movie theater, 2,000 feet from any public or private school, day care center or nursery, 2,000 feet from any public park, and 1,320 feet from either a facility holding a liquor license or a church, synagogue or other place of worship.

The section defines an 'adult bookstore' as an establishment with a substantial or significant portion of its stock, or a dedicated section, devoted to 'explicit sexual material,' and an 'adult movie theater' as an enclosed building seating 50 or more persons that presents such material; 'explicit sexual material' is itself defined through a three-part list covering pictorial depictions, artificial sexual devices, and printed matter dominated by sexual content. Beyond the spacing rule, § 22-144(b)(2) and (3) separately make it unlawful to sell, circulate or expose obscene material in any public place or store window, or to keep such material where minors may encounter it.

The section traces to Code 1976 §§ 12-230, 12-231 and was last amended by Ord. No. 141-23 on December 4, 2023. It carries no dollar fine of its own, so a violation is punished under the chapter-wide § 22-234 penalty, which fines the offender as established by village ordinance or resolution and can add the full cost of any abatement the village performs.