DUNCANVILLE — The Duncanville City Council unanimously approved an ordinance Tuesday night preventing the operation of sex clubs in residences in response to complaints from neighbors of a private swingers club.

Council member Johnette Jameson said the ordinance was the result of years of complaints about activities at the home near Cedar Ridge Drive and Interstate 20. Although the city has regulations pertaining to sexually oriented businesses, it has not been able to document business activities at the home, which is in Jameson's district.

She said the ordinance is targeting public nuisances related to the Cherry Pit club rather than what people are doing as part of the club.

"We are not addressing what activities are going on," she said. "We're addressing the traffic. We have to be good neighbors to each other."

Mayor David Green agreed that nearby residents have been bothered by the influx of cars coming to the home.

"People can't find parking," he said. "It's really detracting from the neighborhood."

But one of the home's residents, Julie Norris, said she thinks city officials are disguising their attempts to regulate private behavior at her home by complaining about traffic.

"If it was about traffic, why are there only [no parking] signs in front of my house?" she asked.

Norris said she intends to fight the ordinance, which she said was a threat to her civil liberties.

But Duncanville city spokeswoman Tonya Lewis said she thinks the designation of the Cherry Pit as a sex club is a means to an end for fixing the traffic problems.

Neighbors who spoke at Tuesday's council meeting said Norris' private activities had become a public annoyance because of the traffic her home draws. They also expressed concern that activities at the home were a threat to their property values.

The ordinance defines a sex club as "any premises, person or organization that is presented, advertised, held out or styled as, or which provides notification to the public that it is a swinger's club; an adult encounter group or center; a sexual encounter group or center; party house or home; wife, spouse or partner-swapping club; or that it provides permission, an opportunity or an invitation to engage in or to view sexual activity, stimulation or gratification, whether for consideration or not."

Norris said she does not let "just anyone" visit her home. She also said that though she does ask for donations from guests to cover expenses such as food, they are not necessary to the operation.

Glenda Moses, 30, who said she has been attending the swingers group for three years, said 60 to 70 people are regulars at the house on the weekends.

She said that when she first started going to Norris' home, she did not have sex there. She said it is simply a place where friends spend time together and enjoy music and dancing. She added that she had not had sex with anyone other than her husband at the home.

Moses said city officials "need to worry more about their crime rate and schools. I think they are barking up the wrong tree. No one is doing anything wrong."