Until three years ago, Natrona County residents had a choice of strip clubs.

A person who wanted to watch topless dancers while drinking a beer could either head eight miles north of Casper to Northern Dreams or 35 miles west to the Tumble Inn.

Then in November 2005, the Tumble Inn shut its doors following a year of problems that prompted both the Natrona County Commissioners and sheriff's deputies to intervene.

Northern Dreams, meanwhile, continues to operate largely unnoticed. It's rarely visited by deputies and has avoided the controversy that plagued its former competitor.

Next month, Natrona County will again be home to two strips clubs when prominent bar owner Sonny Pilcher opens a new club six miles west of Casper. Which raises the question: Will the club be more like the Tumble Inn or Northern Dreams?

For Sheriff Mark Benton, whose office will be responsible for monitoring both bars, ownership sets the tone. A good bar owner, regardless of the entertainment inside, means less problems.

"I think if an owner or a manager of any establishment that sells liquor, if they set a standard of service, not only to their customers, but to the citizens of Natrona County in this case, I think they can probably run a place with very little difficulty," he said. "But if you let profit get ahead of operating a safe establishment, you are going to have problems."

Pilcher did not return multiple messages seeking comment for this story. But in an August letter to the Natrona County Commission, which at that time hadn't decided whether to give him a permit, he offered his perspective.

"I believe that incidents in a gentleman's club will be much less than operating as a country or hard rock-n-roll bar, which is what it would have to become if this application is denied," he wrote.

Powder River problems

In the case of the Tumble Inn, the sheriff's office experienced problems with underage drinking inside or just outside the establishment, Benton said. The bar's location in Powder River also led to occasional problems and complaints from neighbors.

"I wouldn't say it was overwhelming, but the Powder River issue did cause me a lot of concern," he said.

In comparison, the sheriff's office doesn't receive many calls related to Northern Dreams. Sheriff's records show about 70 calls since 1995, which works out to roughly five a year.

The calls do includes fights and disturbances, but others are more mundane. Apparently, semi trucks occasionally block a homeowner's driveway when the driver stops in for a beer.

Northern Dreams owner Ed Rojas said he's able to maintain a mellow environment at his club. His customers know that if they start fights, they won't be allowed back, he explained.

"They don't have nowhere else to go, so they put fighting out of their minds," he said.

Public will be watching

Benton doesn't expect Pilcher's club to initially demand a lot of his department's resources.

"Not only our office, but the public as a whole, including the Casper Star-Tribune, is going to pay a great deal of attention to that operation," he said. "I do believe it is going to be an ongoing effort with our office to communicate with the management of this operation. We will not do any more or less bar checks in there than we do anywhere else - unless we start getting a climb in the numbers.

"If the numbers go up, then our attention will go up," he added.

At the same time, Benton noted some of Pilcher's other bars receive regular visits from law enforcement.

Pilcher's Sidelines Sports Bar received the highest number of police calls of any bar in the city, Casper Police Chief Tom Pagel told commissioners in August. Officers responded to 140 calls last year, and Pagel said at the time he expects at least 110 by the end of this year.

At the same time, Pagel noted that Sidelines is "a large establishment that runs the most people through it within our city limits."

Pilcher made a similar point in his letter to the Natrona County commissioners.

"As you do know, Sidelines and the Beacon [another popular Pilcher-owned bar] are exceptionally large facilities that serve more than 4,000 to 5,000 people per week," he noted. "I am sure if there were statistics using the number of police calls and incidents at all bars in Casper, our number of incidents 'per capita' would be very low."

He also told commissioners in his almost 30 years running bars in Casper, he was ticketed only once for a bar serving to a minor.

"I can provide you with the bags full of fake IDs we have confiscated from minors trying to use them at our door," he wrote.

Pilcher will operate his strip club in what was once Cowboys Saloon. In the two plus years he operated that club, sheriff's deputies received 39 calls for fights, disturbances, assaults and public intoxication, according to records provided by the sheriff's office.

Studies offer different conclusions.

But are strip clubs by their nature crime producers? The answer, not surprisingly, depends on whom you ask, or better yet, which study you read.

County Commissioner Matt Keating, who cast the lone vote in opposition to granting Pilcher's permit, points to statistics available from the group Citizens for Community Values. One study he cited, based on data from Phoenix in 1978, found that sex offenses in that city were 506 percent more likely in neighborhoods that had "sexually oriented businesses."

Other studies have come to a completely different conclusion. One, published in 2004, found the presence of adult nightclubs in Charlotte, N.C. did not increase the number of reported crimes in the surrounding area. Instead, the areas around the clubs actually experienced fewer reported crimes than in other comparable areas.

It remains to be seen what kind of impact - if any - Pilcher's club will have on law enforcement. But if the experience of his soon-to-be competitor at Northern Dreams is any indication, it might have more to do with how it's run than whether the women inside are wearing clothing.

"We never let a confrontation start," Rojas said. "If we see just a little spat, we will shut it down. We will tell them right now, there ain't no fighting. If you fight, you ain't coming back."

Reach crime reporter Joshua Wolfson at (307) 266-0582 or at josh.wolfson@trib.com.