|
|||||||
| Coffee Lounge Talk amongst other community members. |
 |
|
|
LinkBack | Topic Tools | Rate Topic |
Nov 13, 02
|
|||
|
|||
|
WTF? NYC vs. Dancing?
|
|
Nov 13, 02
|
|||
|
|||
|
the actual link is http://www.nypost.com/postopinion/op...ists/61985.htm
____ November 13, 2002 -- THE Slipper Room, a small lounge on Orchard Street, is a den of criminal activity, says the city Department of Consumer Affairs. The crime: Dancing. After its inspectors visited in May 2001, the DCA fined the lounge's owners, Camille and James Habacker, $150 for breaking the cabaret laws for using a DJ, for charging admission and for those degenerate, illicit dancers. A year later, it fined them $30,000 for dancing and padlocked their doors. The fine was cut to $6,000 after they pleaded guilty. Otherwise, the lounge would have remained padlocked (generating zero income) until a hearing some 60 days away. What's going on here? Mayor Bloomberg is picking up where Rudy Giuliani left off, trying to curb New York's night life in the name of "quality of life." The city says it's using the dancing law to attack noise, unruly crowds, public urination, etc. But small, fairly quiet establishments have been zapped, too. Arbitrary enforcement has been a problem ever since the ban on unlicensed dancing went on the books in 1926. Then, it was used to shut down jazz clubs and discourage interracial socializing, and yes, dancing. In the '50s and '60s, it was a weapon against the proliferation of gay Village bars - a crackdown that led to the Stonewall riots. DCA Commissioner Gretchen Dykstra admits the law is too vague: "We're talking to [everyone] involved with this issue, to clarify the law, in order to address the real problem - which is quality of life." But "quality of life" can be a pretty vague term, too. Bars and dance halls are just as much a part of our legendary culture as the city's museums and other cultural attractions. City Councilman Alan Gerson thinks the city's using the dancing ban as an indirect way at getting at legitimate problems (like noise). "We're regulating something that doesn't need to be regulated," says Gerson. "At its worst, the laws penalize appropriate rights of self-expression." And it's just bad business. "If clubs aren't taking in income, then the tax revenue is decreasing," says attorney Norman Siegel, who represents the Habackers. Today, just 273 establishments - in a city of thousands of bars, lounges and clubs - legally allow dancing. Cabaret licenses are granted only in manufacturing and commercial zones. But with the thorough gentrification of Manhattan, those areas are vanishing. So what's the answer? "We need to try to persuade people that the current noise laws haven't been fairly enforced," says Siegel. Gerson agrees and adds that, though it will take longer, an eventual rewriting of the law is required. But the road ahead may get bumpy. Many bar and lounge owners are worried that super-strict noise laws can also be abused to continue the crackdown on the city's night life. "Will everyone agree on this? Hell no, this is New York," says Siegel. "Maybe we'll have a dance contest to decide." E-mail: [email protected] _____ it's basicly the same thing that happened in seattle 2 years ago.
|
