{"id":1525,"date":"2006-09-07T13:16:19","date_gmt":"2006-09-07T21:16:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bridgeandtunnelclub.com\/wordpress\/archives\/2006\/09\/red_flag_number_one_whenever_a_business_lobby_calls_a_regulatory_boards_move_judicious_and_measured.html"},"modified":"2006-09-07T13:16:19","modified_gmt":"2006-09-07T21:16:19","slug":"red_flag_number","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bridgeandtunnelclub.com\/blog\/archives\/2006\/09\/red_flag_number.html","title":{"rendered":"Red Flag Number One: Whenever A Business Lobby Calls A Regulatory Board’s Move “Judicious And Measured”"},"content":{"rendered":"

How a four-month moratorium on issuing liquor licenses needing a 500-foot exemption<\/a> answers the issue of bouncer murders and underage drinking I don’t know — but I think there’s more to this ostensibly civic-minded decision than meets the eye:<\/p>\n

The state liquor board yesterday imposed an immediate four-month freeze on approving liquor licenses for areas of New York City that already have three or more license holders within 500 feet of each other.<\/p>\n

The unanimous action by the New York State Liquor Authority, which was immediately denounced by a trade group of city nightclubs, follows the deaths this year of two young women. They were killed after drinking heavily at nightspots in SoHo and Chelsea.<\/p>\n

Robert Bookman, a lawyer for the New York Nightlife Association, a trade group of 125 bars and nightclubs, mainly in Manhattan, said the action was unfair. It has “thrown the industry into chaos within the last few hours,” he said.<\/p>\n

Mr. Bookman added, “If I have my lifetime savings wrapped up in a place that I’m prepared to open Oct. 1 and now I can’t get a license until January, how am I going to pay $30,000 in monthly rent and not be able to open?”<\/p>\n

By contrast, Scott Wexler, executive director of the Empire State Restaurant and Tavern Association, with 5,000 members statewide, called the state action “judicious and measured.”<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Enlightened self interest: doing the right thing for the public — traffic! loitering! murder<\/em>! — all while keeping competition at bay. Genius!<\/p>\n

Bonus angle: is all or some of this connected to this announcement<\/a>?<\/p>\n

And who is this organization with 5,000 members statewide<\/em>? Aren’t there like 20,000 restaurants in the five boroughs alone?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

How a four-month moratorium on issuing liquor licenses needing a 500-foot exemption answers the issue of bouncer murders and underage drinking I don’t know — but I think there’s more to this ostensibly civic-minded decision than meets the eye: The state liquor board yesterday imposed an immediate four-month freeze on approving liquor licenses for areas […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[61],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1525","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-smells_fishy_smells_not_right"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bridgeandtunnelclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1525","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bridgeandtunnelclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bridgeandtunnelclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bridgeandtunnelclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bridgeandtunnelclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1525"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.bridgeandtunnelclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1525\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bridgeandtunnelclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1525"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bridgeandtunnelclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1525"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bridgeandtunnelclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1525"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}