I Chose the Omni Shoreham
to take a Stand Against
"Porn Shops Built to Look Like Hotels"

A note from Marshall Fritz

When I began planning SepCon2004, quite by accident I stumbled my way into an article about the president of the Omni hotel chain and why he was ending the showing of "adult movies" in his hotels.

The Omni Shoreham is the only convention hotel in the Washington, D.C. area that doesn't show porn....and even though it's a more luxurious hotel than we really need for SepCon, they made their price quite affordable to our clientele. Hooray!

Now I've begun the search in Southern California for SepCon2006 (April 28-30, two weeks after Easter), hoping that I can find what Phil Burress calls a "clean hotel." It's not easy, it turns out. Too much money in porn, I guess.

Here are some links if you are interested in this movement to get hotels to not offer the stuff. BTW, nobody that I know of is trying to censor what people can see in private. Burress is clear all he is trying to do is to pressure hotels into not offering it. There's a big difference!

Concerned Women for America report on
"Clean Hotels" Campaign by Phil Burress

"The list of hotel chains that are believed to have a policy prohibiting the offering of pay-per-view porn are Crossland, Drury Inn, Extended Stay, Jameson Inns, Motel 6, Omni Hotels, Studio Plus and Signature Inns."

Full article at the Concerned Women for America Web Site (click here for the article)

USA Today

"We're going to put on a full-court press ... to educate people that hotels are distributing hard-core pornography," says Phil Burress, president of the Cincinnati-based Citizens for Community Values, one of the groups in the coalition that he says represents at least 20 million families and meets regularly."

Full article at USA Today's national news section (click here for the article)

Porn-industry Newsletter

"Omni chairman Bob Rowling, though, says the chain shouldn't be making money on porn. ''I'm a father of two boys,'' he told USA Today. ''It wasn't the kind of thing we wanted offered at our hotels.'' Marketing vice president Peter Strebel said the guest reaction to the move is positive, with only a few complaints.

"The move will cost Omni plenty, though, since adult programming covers about three-quarters of hotels' in-room movie sales, according to Cabil Corp., a support and billing service for cable television operators. Omni now will lose its cut of the undisclosed adult movie rental proceeds and will need to find around $4 million to replace televisions placed free by their previous cable provider, according to USA Today."

Note.... we're not linking to this particular site.

Hotel-industry Report

"Peter Strebel, Omni Hotels vice president of marketing, says the company's "pro-family" stance regarding its business operations was in direct conflict with the movie service. 'Money is not the issue in this matter,' says Strebel. 'Not all business decisions should be fiscally driven. We believe that this is the right thing to do; the right thing for Omni Hotels, our associates and our customers.'

"The anticipated loss in revenue demonstrates the company's commitment to the issue. Omni Hotels has already removed adult magazines from the gift shops at its owned and managed properties."

Full article at the Hotel Online web site's press releases

Omni Hotels News Release

"IRVING, Texas (Nov. 5, 1999) - Omni Hotels announced today that it would be removing adult pay-per-view movies from its guest room televisions."

Full news release at http://www.omnihotels.com/omniinfo/default.asp?topic=view&pr_id=52

Omni Owners Interviewed on Christian Radio

Dennis Rainey interviews the owners of the Omni Hotel chain about the decision, the problem, and the cost of withdrawing from the porn rental business:

Jim Caldwell: I was in a room at one of my hotels where you could just watch whatever you wanted to as you scrolled through the TV. Well, I wonder what in the world we were doing, as a company, giving this kind of option to anybody, particularly young kids.

Bob Rowling: Once we became aware of the magnitude of what was being shown, it was really a pretty easy decision just to say, "No, we don't want to do that." It just isn't the right thing to do for us or, really, for anybody. (Broadcast Date: 03/15/04)

Sound track and transcript of this interview: http://www.familylife.com/fltoday/default.asp?id=7272

Advisory note

The decision to use "clean hotels" for our conferences wherever they are available is a decision of the Alliance president, Marshall Fritz. The Alliance itself takes no position on what constitutes porn and how it should be treated by law or custom. Individual Signatories of the Proclamation (see list of prominent people and list of everybody) have varying opinions as they do on many other subjects.

The only policy statement that binds us is our 11-word Proclamation for the Separation of School and State. You may see it---and even add your name.

Please note that the Proclamation expresses an ideal. It is not a pledge to "do something" nor is it a petition to any potentate for him or her to do anything. Further, it neither expresses a time-frame for its accomplishment nor does it prescribe any particular interim steps. Again, there is much variety of opinion on these topics.