Community Board Moving to Nuke Union Hall
Last night Community Board 6’s landmarks/land-use committee dealt a harsh (albeit symbolic) blow to local watering hole and performance space Union Hall. After a lengthy and often rancorous public hearing about renewing the Park Slope bar and venue’s liquor license, the committee voted 6 to 2 in favor of a motion that denies Union Hall…
Last night Community Board 6’s landmarks/land-use committee dealt a harsh (albeit symbolic) blow to local watering hole and performance space Union Hall. After a lengthy and often rancorous public hearing about renewing the Park Slope bar and venue’s liquor license, the committee voted 6 to 2 in favor of a motion that denies Union Hall a renewal unless the business’s owners sign a contract stipulating that they will take measures to ameliorate noise, such as stopping the sale of alcohol after midnight. Although the motion is ultimately only advisory, the committee member who introduced it—Lou Sones, who himself owns a bar, The Brazen Head on Atlantic Avenue—described it as the community board’s “nuclear weapon” in terms of being a powerful indication to the State Liquor Authority that Union Hall is disturbing the lives of nearby residents. The motion was introduced after a two-hour-long pubic hearing in which many supporters of Union Hall, which is on Union Street between 5th and 6th avenues, spoke about how much they appreciated the business. A good number of residents who live near the establishment, meanwhile, described how noise from the business and its patrons was negatively affecting their quality of life. More people at the hearing, in fact, spoke out in support of Union Hall than against it. Find out what they had to say, and read the anti-UH faction’s claims, on the jump…
The business’s boosters said Union Hall is a great deal more than just a bar or rock venue. One of the people who runs the club’s Secret Science Club, for example, noted that his group has brought three Nobel Laureates to speak at the venue, and comedian Eugene Mirman talked about how his comedy night at the venue has been called one of the best in the city. Union Hall co-owner Jim Carden described how many Brooklyn organizations have held fundraisers at the space and detailed the many ways he and his partners have tried to address noise concerns, from soundproofing to putting up signs like the one at right to trying to hold meetings with block residents who say they’ve been disturbed by the bar’s noise. Some of those residents, who have been complaining about Union Hall for many months now, described not being able to sleep because their street is constantly filled with drunken revelers at all hours of the night and morning. Most dramatically, one Union Street resident said she’d been dealing with auto-immune problems that were directly linked to sleep deprivation. The struggle between Union Hall and its neighbors is one that’s currently being played out all around the city, and community boards have become battlegrounds where the fight between people who want to preserve their residential streets and businesses that want to operate on those streets is played out. A somewhat similar liquor license battle was recently fought over an oyster bar that’s opening on Hoyt Street. The committee’s recommendation on Union Hall will be voted on by all of Community Board 6 next week, and if the full board also backs the motion, the State Liquor Authority will have to weigh the decision when it decides on whether to renew Union Hall’s license at the end of this month.
Neighbors to Union Hall: Shut Up! [Brownstoner]
Shucks! Oyster Bar Dredges Up Controversy on Hoyt [Brownstoner]
For those of you not at the meeting it was a sham. The board let opposers go on and on at the end and did not let or ask UH to respond to the questions. Lou then opposed any mediation with the bar and the block association saying it never works. His main argument was that they didn’t have anyone speaking from the block but what he didn’t take into consideration was the massive amount of letters for the bar from the block and immediate area and the petition signed for the bar with over 20 people from the block.
Hopefully cooler and more intelligent heads prevail at the meeting next week. We as a community need to make sure these advisory committees are ran properly with no conflict of interests. And as stated before, Lou’s bar is located on Atlantic Ave and his main biz competition on that block is Floyd. That’s right Floyd the sister bar to Union Hall.
I agree with the above posters who say that (1) Union Hall can only do so much to control patrons, especially once the patrons leave the bar – c’mon, if 10 people exit the bar and are noisy while walking up the block, how can UH be held accountable for that? It’s like holding a bodega responsible for a customer who discards a candy bar wrapper after leaving the store; and (2) urban noise tolerance – NYC is a city of eight million and noise is inevitable; while there are limits, this ain’t one of ’em. I could see if dozens of patrons were loitering out front, yelling, screaming and fighting, or if they parked their cars and blasted the stereos, but that is not happening here. I think those lodging complaints should sell their homes and move to Rockland County. Plenty of quiet up there.
One more reason why pork slap sucks ….
“take measures to ameliorate noise”
so as long as they make a better kind of noise Union Hall should have no problems?
Union is a noisy block.
Period. It has nothing to do with Union Hall.
It’s a bus route and people are hanging out being loud waiting for the bus, which has a stop right outside Union Hall.
There are a hundred bars within a mile of this place and they use Union Street to walk home…I always do because it has the most activity late at night, seems safer because IT’S NOISY and not desolate!!!!
Listen up, folks:
9:45 Brings up a VERY good point and one that has not yet been brought to light.
I go here at least once a week and NEVER have I heard people being loud outside. The doorman always is telling people to quiet down if they are in front of the bar and most of the loud people are NOT COMING FROM UNION HALL BUT FROM THE BARS ON 5TH AND 4TH AVENUES.
This will never be approved. They will send someone out to monitor the noise before that happened and will see quite clearly what great neighbors Union Hall are.
And in ONE NIGHT you will see what a bunch of crazies these people are, trying to pawn off their noisy block onto Union Hall.
Why would they assume all the noisy people on this block are from Union Hall???
THESE OLD CRAZIES ARE USING UNION AS A SCAPEGOAT FOR THEIR ALREADY LOUD BLOCK!!!!!!
Community boards have been the slow death of this city over the last twenty years. This becoming the city that goes to sleep early because its residents have got to hand off their children to their Phillipino nanny early in the morning so they can go to Pilates class and then mentally jerk themselves off for the “good” they’ve done for their community.
This is New York, not Greenwich you stuck up pricks. It’s a goddamn CITY, it’s supposed to be loud.
I used to live on Union Street near the Food Coop. I was constantly — once or twice a week at least — woken up early by delivery trucks parking outside, beeping as they backed up, or idling their loud engines. So, if the residents really want to complain, they should also focus their energies on the Food Coop. Seems a little unfair to target a bar. Noise is noise, whether it comes from a bunch of drunks yelling after a night out or a bunch of trucks delivering organic milk.
That’s what’s so galling about this complaint: the inconsistency of it all.
Massachusetts bars close at 1:00. Move there.