Union Hall Meeting: The Video
Here’s a video we shot after CB6’s land-use/landmarks committee made a motion to recommend that the State Liquor Authority deny Union Hall’s liquor license renewal. The first speaker is Lou Sones, who introduced the motion. The second speaker, another committee member, talks about his misgivings over the motion. Community Board Moving to Nuke Union Hall…
Here’s a video we shot after CB6’s land-use/landmarks committee made a motion to recommend that the State Liquor Authority deny Union Hall’s liquor license renewal. The first speaker is Lou Sones, who introduced the motion. The second speaker, another committee member, talks about his misgivings over the motion.
Community Board Moving to Nuke Union Hall [Brownstoner]
This is a really tricky issue and i’m afraid there is no clear cut solution to it. I can see very convincing points on either side, so I’m going to limit my comment here to address what I feel is an unfair misrepresentation.
I am a native to Brooklyn, and have lived in this community for many years now. I know both Lou Sones and the owners of Floyd/Union Hall personally, and very truly like both parties as people and business owners. While I am not choosing sides in the struggle itself, I think it is ignorant and unfair to make this into an attack on Lou personally. While it may seem clear on the surface to simply say that it is a conflict of interest for him to be taking this position, I am convinced that it is not. First of all, Floyd and The Brazen Head are in no way competitors — anyone living in that part of the neighborhood can tell you that. If I were to hazard a guess, I would say that O’Keefe’s on Court St. caters to the same law-heavy clientele that Brazen Head does. There truly is little to no overlap with Floyd. That being said, bar owners generally want there to be other successful bars around them – it generates more business for all. Just the fact that there is such a vitriolic backlash against him speaking his opinion, and voicing the opinions of the community, shows how wrongheaded everyone has gotten. In fact, I would be inclined to trust a bar owner MORE in this instance, as it takes more courage knowing that he is leaving his own business up to scrutiny.
I’ve just reread that and realized that it probably seems like I am standing behind Lou and am in support of shutting down Union Hall. This is not true at all. But I think we all need to be careful about where we hang our misguided ire.
Union street between 4th and 7th Avenues are not residential blocks. They are mixed use blocks. They are two way thorough fairs on which commerical truck traffic is directed to and a bus route runs along. As such, people living on those three blocks must assume they are going to have to live with higher noise decibel levels than if they were living on a true residential block.
Lou Sones clearly has a serious conflict of interest. He is opening himself up to litigation by not recusing himself from this issue. It’s no different than if he were a restaurant owner denying another restaurant owner int he same community a license to operate.
Does anyone have Lou Sone’s e-mail address so we can e-mail him and let him know how outraged we are at his clear conflict of interest and pushing for something that will clearly benefit his own business. Shame on you Lou!
As word spread this past weekend of what went down at the meeting, it’s been made clear that Brazen Head will lose a LOT of customers due to Lou’s behavior (customers that frequented his bar as well as all of the others on Atlantic Avenue). It’s really a shame as the Brazen Head has a delicious beer selection and a lovely bar staff. Regardless, I will never step foot in there again… Incidentally, is it true that Lou doesn’t even live in Park Slope, but in Red Hook?
Fortunately CBs have little influence over the Liquor Board, especially in cases of license renewals for establishments with few or no serious violations such as Union Hall. I’ve been involved in bar-related buseness in NYC for over 20 years and I have seen all this unnecessary hot air stirred up by some bored and lonely CB members many times and each time the licenses were renewed. Can’t these people devote their time to something useful, such as taking care of trees, street garbage, playgrounds, etc.? What a huge misdirection of time and energy!
Union Hall is a *huge* contributor the economy of Park Slope?!
“some people don’t like the noise”
Well then some people should not move onto one of the largest, longest mixed use streets in Brooklyn.
Union Hall is an amazing place that treats artists very well who play there, and that is a huge contribution to the culture, economy, hipness and flat out relevance of Park Slope. Any Slopers trying to shut it down are idiots. Park Slope is over if they succeed. It will have officially become the most uncool neighborhood in NYC. The neighborhood will have jumped the shark. If it hasn’t already. There are great new bars and growing communities of young hip residents in other neighborhoods. The shift has begun.
Utterly ridiculous. Clearly this bar exists in a commercial zone, otherwise it wouldn’t have been approved to open. Lou Sones’ comments at the beginning are either ignorant or just plain stupid. You can’t just tell a bar to shut down and move because it exists 200 feet from what he and some local cranks arbitrarily consider to be the commercial zone.
And as someone who does occasionally drink at Sones’ bar, he can be assured that he has lost my patronage as well as many others’ in the area.
It’s worth pointing out that the Landmarks/Land Use Committee barely had a quorum at this public hearing–only 10 of 20 members were in attendance. Also, the vote wasn’t exactly unananimous: Only 6 committee members actually voted against Union Hall.
Looking at minutes of previous meetings, it appears unusual for this committee to be so divided.
Hopefully, when the vote goes to the full board, the debate will be less one-sided and cooler heads will prevail. Mediation is the way to go.
Meanwhile, check out the “Insider Report” on this blog for a different view of the noise level: http://edlevineeats.seriouseats.com/2008/05/union-hall-bar-park-slope-brooklyn-noise-bloody-marys.html