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Thursday, August 17, 2006

Nightlife Task Force and Mayor Still Miles Apart on New Club Regs

Posted by on August 17 at 16:30 PM

The mayor’s Nightlife Task Force met yesterday in the claustrophobic Boards and Commissions room in the basement of city hall to discuss the mayor’s proposal to license nightclubs, an issue on which the two sides are still nowhere close to agreement. Originally, the mayor’s office had proclaimed the meeting of the public advisory committee closed; but the meeting was reopened after open-government watchdogs pointed out the slippery legality of closing a public meeting.

Belying Film and Music Office director James Keblas’s claim on KUOW earlier in the day that bar and club owners, neighborhood activists, and the mayor’s office were “all working together” and “getting close to finalizing” a list of nightclub regulations, yesterday’s meeting was a raucous, tense affair, with bar and club owners handing mayoral staffer Jordan Royer a red-lined version of the mayor’s proposed legislation that included dozens of changes, many of them significant, encompassing nearly every single paragraph of the ordinance. (I’ll post a scan here shortly; there really is virtually no overlap between the two proposals.) Among the provisions bar and club owners found most troubling:

• A provision allowing the mayor’s office to issue a notice of violation (which, if sustained, would shut a club down for 30 days, effectively killing the business) without first giving the club a chance to talk to the new nightclub advisory board and work to resolve the problem. (Royer told Downtown Seattle Association member Kate Joncas, who is on the task force, that the mayor’s “intent” was to have plenty of due process; but unless that due process is written into the ordinance, Joncas noted, it wouldn’t be binding on Nickels or any future mayor.

• A section requiring club owners to “prevent” patrons from bringing in weapons or drugs or engaging in violence. Red Door owner and task force co-chair Pete Hanning told Royer, exasperated, “I am not going to pat down my customers. I’m not going to make them feel like they’re coming to an unsafe place. The language as written… is not something we’re going to agree to.” Once again, the response from Royer—a variation on “as long as you’re not doing anything wrong, it won’t affect you’—was vague and unsatisfying. “If they try to keep it the way they had it written, we’ll scream bloody murder,” Hanning said later.

• A provision defining a sound violation as any noise that is “clearly audible” inside a neighbor’s residence, an utterly subjective standard that would, as the Fenix’s Rick Wyatt pointed out, require “someone to stand in the guy’s apartment” to see if a complaint was valid.

• A provision requiring club owners to patrol the area up to 100 feet outside their club for 30 minutes before and after closing time. “In Belltown, you’d have people crisscrossing people up and down the street,” Hanning says. Besides, “that’s when I need people in my restaurant,” he said.

“That’s pretty much taken straight out of San Francisco,” which has its own club license, Royer retorted.

• Another section requiring club staff to call 911 any time they witness any illegal activity. “Panhandling and smoking crack are illegal too—we’d be calling 911 constantly,” Showbox owner Jeff Steichen said. Royer’s testy response: “Everyone knows what illegal activity is. It’s kind of common sense.”

• A provision requiring clubs to staff a telephone to take complaints at all hours—something Royer also said was “again, right out of San Francisco. I didn’t make this stuff up.”

A larger issue, neighborhood activists and bar owners such as Hanning have pointed out, is that the club ordinance—which is supposed to help neighborhoods crack down on public nuisances associated with nightlife—doesn’t apply to bars at all. That means that in Fremont, which has reported a dramatic surge in violence, noise and public-urination incidents in recent years, only three businesses—Nectar, the High Dive, and Tost—would be affected. How would this cut down on drunken unruliness from the dozens of other drinking establishments in the area? No one at the mayor’s office is answering that question. “None of the things people are complaining about—noise and people peeing in people’s yards and parking and violence—are addressed by this ordinance,” industry gadfly and music promoter Dave Meinert says.

Moreover, the new regulations don’t include any new infrastructure to help clubs, save one new city staffer who will likely be overwhelmed implementing the perplexing maze of new regulations. And there’s nothing in the proposal to increase police presence in nighttime hot spots, probably the single most effective thing the city could do to improve nightlife for club patrons and neighborhood residents.

With so much still unresolved, you’d think the task force would need to meet several more times, at least, to reach a compromise on draft legislation. (Indeed, yesterday was the first time the task force had sat down to discuss the legislation itself; at the last meeting, the task force only had a two-page outline to go from.) Instead, the mayor’s office has decided to fast-track the process, moving the date it will send legislation to the city council up from January to September. “The negotiations are getting to a place everybody can agree on,” Keblas said on the radio before the meeting.

“I do not feel that is at all appropriate,” Hanning said today. “This was the most productive meeting we’ve ever had, and yet Jordan and the mayor’s office were saying it was the last meeting.” Late yesterday afternoon, Royer sounded open to the idea of holding one final meeting. However, as we were leaving, we ran into Deputy Mayor Tim Ceis outside the board room. I asked him whether the task force would be meeting again.

“Oh, I don’t think so,” Ceis replied.


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Hi there I was reading the Article by Noel Black and I see no reason to pick on one website for this reason. I think it is kind of unfair to just pick this one site to put a full two page layout step by step showing how to rip off a christian website in The Stranger, when they are a lot of other websites and people that are anti-gay. I think those two pages have been wasted and could have been used for something more useful and helpful to mankind, like more info on the Seattle Police officer that was killed or the Jewish shooting down town. I think this was very childish of Noel Black to write such a Article. He should have went about it a better way.

I disagree

I don't need to know any more about our home-grown example of why crazy-people and religion are a volatile mix, and there's nothing we can do about EMS personel getting killed in wrecks that isn't already being done - it's just another traffic accident.

In stark contrast - ripping off some anti-gay group is something that we can do to help improve the future. We're told too much about things we can't do anything about as it is.

PS: It's almost too obvious to mention, but Jeff? You're way off-topic here. The story you're interested in commenting on is three or so blocks down the page under the title "Letter of the Day".

The emperor has no clothes! (don't disagree with Nickels & Dimes, he'll just shut you out)
Any solution needs to include bars, as was pointed out.

And, um, those 2 posts above are WAY off.

"That means that in Fremont, which has reported a dramatic surge in violence, noise and public-urination incidents in recent years, only three businesses—Nectar, the High Dive, and Tost—would be affected."

Woah! Hey, we've been having problems with the Triangle and the Ballroom more than the three you mentioned.

Seems to me that the Nightlife Advisory Taskforce has been a going concern for over a year. That should have been enough time to come up with some recommendations. There is no reason the Taskforce could not have come up with their own ideas instead of waiting on city staff to do it for them. I don't think it is accurate to blame the Mayor for a lack of results.
It is sad and telling that few owners who are willing to work on the issue like Wyatt, Hanning and Eberhard will have to deal with consequences of those who refuse to take any responsibilty.
And by the way. None of the Neighborhoods have been given the privelege of reviewing these proposals in a formal meeting or otherwise.

a lot of the public urination is from the people pushed out of downtown by the police crackdowns on homeless, actually - they come to Fremont and Ballard whenever the richie riches get into a fit.

but the violence is mostly the drunks from the bars. not a lot of hopped up sushi or thai demons, IMHO.

WinS-

Right... No "richie rich" types in Fremont or Ballard.

As a Belltownist, the "police crackdowns" on the homeless and drug addicted are only a fantasy in your mind. No such thing happens. We'd like it to happen, but it doesn't.

If you thought that the regs were strict under the mayors proposal, just wait. Now that the neighborhoods are aware of their chance to inflict themselves - we're all fucked! Thanks Stranger for turning this molehill into a mountain and ensuring that we'll all soon be subjected to the tyranny of the majority. Nice work taskforce for wasting the best chance to strike a reasonable deal.

This process has become a joke. This ordinance should be oppossed, straight up.

Here's the deal. There is a real problem in some neighborhoods with the behavior of people outside on the street and sidewalks at night. The Mayor took these complaints and used them to justify the Joint Assessment Task Force. We were told the JAT was just meant for gathering information on all late night bsuinesses and was not targetting nightclubs. When it appeared the JAT was only 'gathering info' on nightclubs and no other businesses, and was in fact issuing tickets and harrassing the nightclubs they went into, we were again told not to worry, that the JAT was part of a larger process and not meant to target just nightclubs, and that in fact the process would result in things that assisted nightclubs. Then there was a nightlife advisory committee set up, made up of only bar and nightclub owners and some neigborhood activists - no other late night businesses. They were formed to help create the 'nightclub' ordinance, which of course included nothing to assist nightclubs and targetted, you guessed it, just nightclubs. So we have been directly lied to. If this isn't a lie, then I would like someone from the Mayor's office to explain how it is not.

But even worse, the nightclub ordinance does nothing to address the issues the neighborhoods are complaining about. The Mayor has used neighborhood complaints to draft a new business license, what is known as a 'conditional business license', something Royer told me to my face wouldn't be done, and this business license in no way addresses the concern neighbors have with parking, traffic, noise, etc. Most of the neighborhood complaints result from what individuals are doing on the street once they leave bars, clubs, restaurants, grocery stores and other late night businesses. But not one thing in the ordinance will help deal with these issues.

The Mayor is ignoring neighborhood complaints and attacking an industry that helped get him elected. He has taken the complaints and turned them into a new level of regulations that will allow the city to quickly shut down a business. Now the City's counter to this so far is to not disagree, but to argue back - 'well, what do we do about businesses like Larry's? It was difficult for us to shut that place down.' My reply, the city SHOULD have to go through a tough process to shut down a private business. The Mayor has shown that the City can target a business behaving badly and shut it down if it so desires, as was done with both Larry's and Mr. Lucky, and I think the City should have no more power to do so. It doesn't need it, and putting someone out of business should be difficult. The is already a law on the books allowing the city to immediately close any business posing an immediate threat to public safety. Sure, maybe Nickels has no deisire to abuse this ordinance. But what about the next mayor? What if Sidran becomes Mayor? How would he use this ordinance? Sidran was able to shut down dozens of nightclubs without such an ordinance, why does the city now need this?

This process has been mishandled by the people leading it. It has been dishonest. And it is resulting in an ordinance that doesn't address the issue it claims to be addressing, but does potentially harm the music business. Anyone in Seattle who cares about honesty and integrity in government, who cares about residential quality of life in the city, and/or cares about the music scene should oppose this ordinance. I hope Nick Licata, City Council president, does the right thing and stops the fast track the mayor has put this ordinance on, and then kills it altogether. What the city needs is more police at night to enforce the laws that already exist, more police accountability, and better building codes so an unamplified human voice cannot be heard inside of condos built in busy areas in the city.

Will in Seattle - exactly, and the Mayor is ignoring the problems you have been having with those bars. The new ordinance does nothing to address people coming from those places, just the three nightclubs in Fremont. You should be pissed. You are being ignored, and your concerns co-opted and used to promote a completely different agenda people on the Mayor's staff have.

Why doesn't the city change parking rules in fremont? where are the police at night? why aren't parking lot owners required to patrol their businesses at night?

I'm sure that Royer did lie to your face - I would too - just to get you to shut up for a minute. You're an annoying crackpot with few facts and an overinflated sense of importance. You fashion yourself a "leader" - but on this issue you're leading your industry to the slaughter.

SNAP!

Bar Owner, have the courage to put your name to what you write.

How am I harming the music industry by fighting for fair, sensible legislation? Really, insults aside, as a fellow bar owner, how do you think we should proceed? Go with the rules as they are? You do realize, that if you acutally do own a bar and not a 'nightlcub', the proposed ordinance will not effect you, right?

Get real. You're not fighting for fair and sensible regulation - you're fighting for NO regulation. When club owners refuse to take ANY responsibility for what happens outside their clubs and argue through the press that any attempt to impose new regulations (no matter how watered down and meaningless) is unjustified, it makes the entire nightlife industry look bad.

The status quo simply isn't going to cut it any more in the wake of Larry's and Mr. Lucky's. We can accept what most reasonable people would consider fair standards now - or we can wait for the neighborhoods to weigh in and be stuck with much, much worse in the near future. Best case scenario with no new regs is a world of more and more restrictive Good Neighbor Agreements. Of course, you probably care less about that since you already have your necessary licenses and permits. The promise of a standardized and uniform licensing and permitting process is actually a threat to existing operators like you.

Step outside your echo chamber for just a minute and you'll see a future that isn't bright if we piss all over the oportunities that we've been offered. If you want to march to the beat of divisive politics, so be it - but understand that there are many in the industry that resent your attempts to drag them down with you.

And I'm not ignoring you question as to how I proceed. Once Erica posts the redline, I'll go through it and try to lay it out for you piece by piece.

As to the realization that Mayor's ordinance won't apply to bars - yes, I was aware of that. I've also been told that the redline version proposed by the clubs actually opens it up to everyone with a liquor license. Seems to me that the nightclubs are trying to kill the ordinance by dragging more businesses into the net. Thanks!

Hey, Bar Owner:

Meinert asked you to identify yourself. You're *not* a bar owner. Is your name either Tim, Jordan, or James, perchance?

P.S. I wouldn't rule out Tom or Ed, either. But you ain't industry.

Mr. Bar Owner,

So let me get this straight. You want nightclubs to be forced to get an extra license that can b easily suspended, but not bars, which is what you own (supposedly). But then you blast me for not wanting nightclubs regulated, though you don't want bars regulated. Then blast the nightlife advisory board for wanting all liquor licensess to be fall under the new regs.

So you don't want to be regulated, and don't want to take any responsibility for what happens outside bars, but want nightclubs to take responsibility for what happens outside of their businesses. And if we don't want new regulations, or want the regulations to apply to all liquor licensees equally, we are bringing down the whole industry. Is that right?

PS - I at least have the integrity to take cedit for my positions, and I speak from my years of experience in both politics and business. I am ok with you disagreeing with me. I don't know everything and always want to involve more people. BUT, at least have the integrity to identify yourself, as I do.

I just moved here from Pittsburg and found a great gal on J-date. We've bought a condo, and I want my property values to go up. Real Cities have much tougher night club regulations. New York cleaned up Times Square and now it's some of the most expensive real estate in the country. Regulate these out of control nightclubs so my condo value is protected.

My small bar/nightclub was burglarized last week. We promptly called the cops and were told that they were "too busy" to even pay us a visit or hear any details, we should maybe just call back some other time.

I suspect this whole ordinance fiasco is just to get us to do their jobs for them. Someone issue me a Glock 19 and I'll get right on patrol of the sketchy area nearby instead of my usual routine; booking bands, marketing, keeping up with the books and bills.

All five feet four inches of me should be a powerful deterrent to crime of all kinds. "Citizen's arrest!" I cry. "Please do not urinate on the great cultural mecca that is Seattle!"

Condo Owner: if you bought a condo in a nightclub area, it's your own damn fault. You don't like noise? Don't buy a condo next to a nightclub. Simple.

Now, when the nightclub moves in to a previously-quiet area, that is a different story, and I understand the irritation. But, hey, you buy a condo in Belltown these days, you have to know what the neighborhood is like.

Wah! I want a high fashion condo in the city they set Frasier in, but I still want everything to be like the suburb I left behind in Kansas City! Wah!

Wah! I wanted "urban living", but I thought that meant a Starbucks in the Barne's & Noble, and maybe a beer in a "brewpub" where everyone wore khakis! There are people here that look different than me! Wah!

Wah! I spent WAY too much money on a shitty condo because I was suckered in by some remarkably banal marketing! I thought that the vaguely italian sounding name of my development would make me fee European! But all I'm getting are loud noises at night and the smell of pee-pee! Wah!

Wah! I don't want government involved in my life but I want the city to do something about this noise! Wah!

Based on your other posts I think you're trolling (or spamming for j-date) anyway, but whatever.

I was referring to Condo Owner, not Spoiled Newcomers.

Litlnemo-

I get that you intellectually identifiy with a children's cartoon, but I got to say most children have a better understanding urban issues than you do.
Basically, your "argument" is that anyone who wants to open a Nightclub can drive existing or future residents out of Seattle for their personal profit. What part of Seattle will be livable with your childish understanding? The City has been getting denser for the last 20 years. Maybe you did not pick up on this obvious fact. In the next 20 years it won't be just Belltown or Pioneer Square but Green Lake, Madison Park and Columbia City that has Nighclub issues.
And I agree wiht Meinert. Everyone who posts should do so under their own name instead some fantasy Star-Trek wannabe handle.

Zander,

It seems like there are serious issues in Belltown not being addressed here - drug dealing, general crime, public urination, people misbehaving on the streets, bars and clubs all letting out thousans of people onto the streets at the same time, etc. It seems to me the city has dodged these issues again. Don't you think more Police at night in Belltown would have more positive impact than requiring more regulation of what happens in the 7 or 8 bars that fall under the definition of a 'nightclub' (out of the dozens of bars in the area)?
And what of the idea the nightlife advisory committee presented the city of staggered bar closing times so not everyone leaves the late night businesses at the same time?

One of the things not previously pointed out is that the neighborhood representatives on the task force hated the original ordinance, too.

Dave-

I'd go for more police. (Providided they are not from the the Office Powers camp.)
The thing is. Why should one particular industry, like Nightclubs, enjoy a special subsidy? The Mariners and Seahawks pay for all their added activity police needs.
Really, if I ran a coffee shop that generated dozens of 911 calls shouldn't that shop be shut down? Why should Nightclub owners entitled to more police than say schools or shopping malls? Is protecting a Nightclub crowd from itself more important than investigating a bulgary or murder? Don't the police have more important things to worry about?
If Nightclub owners want to pass the hat to provide security we won't have these problems. However, We both know; For a fact that, that will never happen. They want to have their cake and eat it too. They have specific profit margin where civic regard goes out the window.
Belltown, it is true, has a lot problems. Adding to them doesn't help things.

What businesses are responsible for bringing all the people downtown during the day? Shouldn't they likewise have to pay for the extra police needed during the day?

Again, taking a neighborhood, let's say Fremont, and looking at all the late night businesses there - bars, cafes, grocery stores, mini-marts, and yes nightclubs, we see the proposed ordinance only applies to three businesses. You can't lay all the issues in Fremont at the feet of these three businesses.

Zander, as you know, Nightlcubs did used to hire off duty police to handle their patrons outside of their businesses. But the city has decided to no longer allow this. It is wrong for you to say the clubs won't do this, they CAN'T do it, but many want to.

And, uh, I think they Mariners and Seahawks get plenty of subsidies from the city, like well over a billion dollars worth of them so far.

And, the condo owners also bring many people downtown, are they being charged to hire more police? I think we should look into this, seems like a good idea.

Bottom line is we both feel there is a need for more police in Seattle. Why not get the neighborhoods and nightlife industries to work together to make this happen? Their certainly doesn't seem to be the political will from the Mayor to do this, maybe some Council member with some foresight will take this issue on.

"Bar Owner" is has got to be a provacateur.

WOW.

Why does someone choose to occupy that role? - interests. Not just those folks with public policy objectives. Rather, someone whose getting paid. I'd look beyond city employees though. Who else is motivated to 1) make a deal and 2) needs to discredit one of the voices representing those not part of the new industry group (Meirert) to be able to make the deal?

I think you have one of the first names right...

I don't usually enjoy intense suffering, but I suspect many of you voted for the smoking ban -- so, to those of you who did nothing to ventilate your businesses, or who just don't like anyone around because they're different from your lily asses -- enjoy the karma byatches.

I would have expected you dumbshits to have learned your lesson from the smoking ban. Rather than working with the anti-smoking nazis to put together a workable plan, you bitched and moaned and claimed that a ban would destroy your business. Rather than pushing for a compromise you got a draconian, extremist law shoved down your throat.

Who says they aren't working to a compromise, Dick Smoker? This was the first meeting after the review of a first draft ordinance. That's the time to *begin* a negotiation process.

Then the Mayor announces that its also the last meeting. Clearly compromise was not wanted--the Mayor believed that the task force would be nothing more than a rubber stamp, and when it doesn't turn out that way, he wants to be rid of it.

** Wrote:

""Bar Owner" is has got to be a provacateur.

WOW.

Why does someone choose to occupy that role? - interests. Not just those folks with public policy objectives. Rather, someone whose getting paid. I'd look beyond city employees though. Who else is motivated to 1) make a deal and 2) needs to discredit one of the voices representing those not part of the new industry group (Meirert) to be able to make the deal?

I think you have one of the first names right... "

Do you really think the Nightclub Lobbyist would throw his own clientele to The Shark?

Keep it up, guys, this is great.

Thanks for the great posts on this. Live in crusty old First Ave Belltown building, owners too poor to upgrade thin 90-year-old windows boo hoo. Don't forget lotsa poor and old longtime neighborhood residents hanging on here with all the changes, not just chichi newbie condo fuckwad speculators. Bars & clubs seem to come & go; we can reasonably trust today's owners to book decent bands and sling OK drinks and that's it, and that's fine. I'm unhappy with city's effort to shift public safety responsibility to bartenders. Though I fucking hate cop guns and body armor, only policia can be instructed to behave like they give a shit. Let's just hire and instruct nightlife-specific cops to walk around all fucking night nagging bartenders and baby barflies: people who can't afford triple-pane windows do live around here so control the music audible outside your joint, gimme your keys and take a cab you drunk eastsiders, pipe down shrieky french-manicured girl gangs, and quit shooting eath other outside Venom, twice so far this year for fucksake.

Here's the thing on a 'compromise'. All the club owners went into this process being told they would have real input and be listened to, but not one of their initial ideas were considered or taken seriously. The whole 'process' was about the City handing them a new ordinance to 'review' and then rubber stamp. The game the Mayor has played on similar proposals is to present something very extreme, 'compromise' on a few points they knew from the beginning they would give on, try to look like they are being reasonable so the other side looks bad if they oppose the legislation, then pass it off to a divided council that won't make many changes, then claim victory. This is exactly what has happened here again. The initial input and ideas the advisory board gave was ignored. Then they were presented with the outrageous ordinance that Erica wrote about. The advisory group gave their comments. Now the city is saying thanks, we'll take your comments under advisement, see ya. I have served on city task forces. That is not a real process. We'll see what happens. Maybe the city will take the advisory committee's comments into consideration and draft a decent ordinance. Everyone doubts it. More than likely they will revise a couple of points. Either way there should be several more meetings to get the ordinance right, and to even consider if the ordinance is what is needed to solve the issues at hand - because it clearly is not. But if the process is on the 'fast track' as Jordan Royer claims it is, there will be no more time for advisory board input, so how could there be a compromise? A compromise implies different sides coming together, but if one side, the City in this case, refuses to meet with the other side and listen to them, a compromise is impossible.

The City all along wanted not to listen to club owners and residents on how to solve the serious issues out there, but rather wanted to create a smoke screen that would allow them to create a new type of business license for nightclubs, something they claimed they weren't doing. They had the ideas for the form of license they wanted to create before they even started the JAT, and pushed it on an advisory committee created to copt the industry so they could tell council the ordinance is backed by both the industry and neighborhoods, which is a joke. The whole process has been a dishonest sham, and further, it has been executed rather incompetently.

The last sentence encapsulates the Nickels administration perfectly.

Belltown has always had those problems. It's just the newcomers there believed the TV hype and aren't from around here.

hey, shocking news, we're a Port city - that means we have drug users - especially near the waterfront!

duh ...

Here's what the nightclub owners don't want to acknowledge: Neighborhood residents have been coming to them for years with complaints -- some petty, obviously, and some not. The nightclubs paid lip service, promised changes and nothing happened (or were forgotten after a couple weekends). A few were more honest and simply told the residents to go fuck themselves.

I cannot describe to you sense of amusement I feel when I read the whinging and whining from nightclub operators that the city is paying lip service to them in this ordinance "debate" and how they're furious that the city isn't taking their suggestions seriously.

How does it feel, BITCHES?

Enjoy the payback. It's been a long time in coming.


Well stated Belltoons,it and to be said.

above post: and=had

Does anyone know where I can find a copy of the Mayor's proposal?

It all sounds like the rebirth of prohibition to me.

It's really sad, because if the most exciting venues Seattle can bring to the table under this regime are places like Twist and the new version of Axis, then we're all screwed: Lounge land.

None of the problems being adressed have anything to do with the clubs. It always was and always will be the streets, and Seattle, the SPD in particular, going back to how they have mishandled Fat Tuesday, the Kristopher Kime situation, WTO and other "street" situations, has never figured out what to do with the streets outside of clubs, or how to handle large crowds in general. I guess if you want to shut down the city and the clubs to make the streets safe then that is one way to solve the problem.

My girlfriends and I went to Larrys all the time. We used to to to Celebrity before the city shut that venue down as well. Those clubs were exciting. There were never any issues "in" the clubs, only outside, and never as exaggerated as the media has made them.

Imagine if those places and others were allowed to hire uniformed, off duty police, inside as well as outside the clubs at closing.

Imagine if Belltown, Kirkland, or Fremont were able to collectively hire as many uniformed off duty police as necessary to adress the "real" issues that neighbors and the general public seem to be upset about.

Do you think that might solve some of the perceived problems? I'm guessing the clubs might enjoy working with advocates as opposed to buerocrats there to help them solve these issues as well.

My girlfriends and I have talked confidentially to a lot of police officers who feel that a closing hour of 4 am veruses 2 am would allow people to party, get bored, burn out, get tired, go home, whatever. They feel that other cities, i.e. New York, Vancouver BC, understand this instinctively and have headed that direction so as not to spill everyone out of every club at 1:45 as it currently exists here in Mayberry, I mean Seattle.

Vancouver BC allows a 19 year old drinking age, ( Duh!) and 3:00 AM closings. They counter this with huge police presence and mandatory DUI posts rather than random. This means that " everyone" sho goes out, from 19 to 90, will get spot checked, depending on where they have been. This creates a huge awareness on the need for designated drivers. This is pro active and progressive thinking. It's a much bigger party guys, and a lot of fun, with safety built in.

Vancouver also has strip clubs that serve alchohol, where the customer demographic is mainstream and at least 50% female.

Another novel idea would be business and tax incentives to create club and nightlife zones that have less density, maybe the industrial area of Seattle.

I'm afraid all of this thinking is just way too progressive.

The handling of this is just a microcosm of the right wing conservative direction this country seems to be headed in.

Shut down one party, it just starts up someplace else. It's human nature.

Maybe prohibiion is the answer. Then the public can take it into their own hands again.


Kari.

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