By MARK WAITE

PVT

One business that seems to be prospering in these hard economic times is the world’s oldest profession.

While prominent brothel owner Dennis Hof has drawn most of the attention after taking over Joe Richards’ brothels in Crystal on Monday, a new building is being constructed that will house a brothel just south of Beatty.

Information is sketchy.

Nye County Planning Director Steve Osborne said the owners didn’t have to present plans to his department since the project is outside of the Pahrump Regional Planning District.

Floodplain administrator George Bernath said he didn’t have any plans, and no flood plain permit was required.

Finally, a check with the Pahrump Building and Safety Department confirmed plans were submitted June 17 for the fire inspection stamped “Beatty brothel.”

Charles Abbott and Associates, which operates the county building and safety department, was given authority to perform fire inspections.

The builder, Edward Homes, submitted plans showing a 9,067-square-foot structure with 10 rooms and a restaurant/bar separated by a firewall. The bar includes a dance stage. There is a kitchen attached to the restaurant. The center of the rooms’ area is a courtyard with a swimming pool. It will be a stucco building with a tile roof.

The owner is Guy Brinkman, from Illinois. A check on Internet Web sites showed a person with the same name who owns a nude dance club in Peoria, Ill., called Fantasyland.

Brinkman talked with the owners of The Chicken Ranch, who have been trying to sell their brothel, as well as Richards, before deciding to build his own brothel, according to George Flint, a spokesman for the Nevada Brothel Association.

“I’ve looked at the building and it’s impressive,” Flint said.

Pahrump Senior Building Inspector Brent Steed said the project is nearing completion.

Nye County Sheriff Tony DeMeo said the application for the brothel license was submitted Wednesday.

The property is on the road to the Beatty Airport just off Highway 95. Rupert Bragg-Smith, who sold the Corvette advanced driving school in Pahrump in 2004 that was renamed Spring Mountain Motor Sports Ranch, originally had plans for a two-story bar and restaurant at the location of the new brothel.

During a 2007 interview, Bragg-Smith said it was the site of a historic township called Gold Center. He also had plans for a new racetrack next to the Beatty Airport.

Beatty Town Advisory Board member Bert Bertram said the county recently signed a lease with the brothel owner at the Beatty Airport, where there are plans to construct a hangar for flying in high-end clients.

“I don’t pretend to have the pulse of the town, but I don’t know of any open opposition to what’s going on out there, and it’s common knowledge what it is. I haven’t heard any cross words of people around town about it,” Bertram said.

If 60 percent of Beatty residents support a ballot question this November defining the town’s boundaries, both the new brothel and Angel’s Ladies would be inside the town limits, Bertram said.

“I don’t see a downside because, if anything at all, if it gets a reasonable amount of traffic in there, maybe we’ll get a fixed base operator and fuel at the airport,” Bertram said.

“Beatty’s a nice place to visit, and within reasonable limits, we’d like to get more tourists than we get,” he said.

The Beatty brothel project is nearing completion as Hof assumed management of the Cherry Patch and Mabel’s Whorehouse in Crystal. The property is being renamed Dennis Hof’s Cathouse. Hof owns the Moonlite Bunny Ranch in Mound House, just east of Carson City, which was featured in the HBO series “Cathouse” and “The Love Ranch.”

Hof told the Pahrump Valley Times last month he plans to expand the brothel to include a restaurant and bar. The Nye County Licensing and Liquor Board approved his permit Aug. 17.

Just north of Beatty on Highway 95, Mack Moore, who received approval in December to reopen Angel’s Ladies Brothel after a two-year closure, said at his age, 81, he wasn’t going to worry about the new establishment too much. But he said it could bring more visibility to the Beatty area brothels.

“They’ll get some of my business but they’re going to bring me business. People will understand now that Pahrump is not the only place where there’s brothels. They’ll know that Beatty is the place to go,” Moore said.

The new brothel will help the Beatty economy, Moore said, adding he had 4,300 customers in 2004. The community is also more welcoming to brothels, he said.

“We don’t have any fanatical ministers like in Pahrump. I don’t think they’ll set up prayer meetings across from my brothel,” Moore said.

But Moore added, “I wouldn’t want to invest money in this business the way the economy is and the way the competition is.”

Bobbi Davis, the owner of the Shady Lady Ranch, 20 miles north of Beatty, thought there may be enough business to go around on Highway 95, but it’s difficult for the rural brothels to feed off each other being miles apart.

“The ones up north do pretty good and they’re close together. Our problem is we’re so far apart,” Davis said.

In Pahrump, Sheri’s Ranch and the Chicken Ranch sit right next to each other on the south end of Homestead Road.

“The problem we have is Vegas is running open with their prostitution and nobody is doing anything about it,” Davis said. She said there are reports of as many as 3,000 working girls in Las Vegas.