Moratorium On New Liquor Licenses In North Brooklyn?

Someone needs to pour Community Board 1 in North Brooklyn a stiff drink.

According to Brooklyn 11211:

On Tuesday, the Executive Committee of CB1 Brooklyn voted unanimously to institute a moratorium on new liquor licenses in Williamsburg, Greenpoint and the rest of North Brooklyn. The vote was a response to what the leaders of CB1 see as an over saturation of liquor licenses in the area.

The Board's Public Safety Committee, which reviews liquor license applications, met last night to discuss the issue, and left with more questions than answers. The Committee did not vote on a moratorium, but the issue is sure to come at next Tuesday's full board meeting.

And if the measure passes on Tuesday, North Brooklyn's burgeoning drink scene will join the East Village and the Lower East Side in New York neighborhoods where bar entrepreneurs will have to cut through lots of red tape to open their own watering holes.

Ultimately though, as Grub Street points out, it is not up to CB1 to decide who gets liquor licenses, but The State Liquor Authority -- CB1 is just in the official capacity of party pooper and can make the already tedious process of getting a liquor license that much more tedious.

The board will vote on the measure at a combined public hearing and board meeting, held at the Swinging 60's Senior Citizens Center, 211 Ainslie Street in Brooklyn on Tuesday April 12, at 6:30PM.

Comments

[Max19th]

02:00 PM on 04/12/2011

Good thing hipsters hate speakeasies.

[Max Shaw]

02:55 PM on 04/11/2011

I think Hipsters, just like everyone else, deserve to drink as much as they want..There are so many more bars and restaurants in Manhattan in much closer proximity to each other, I dont see why Brooklyn needs to be a target of a moratorium on licenses.

[mikeodd]

05:56 PM on 04/10/2011

As cloying and pretentious as hipsters may be, this is an unnecessary abuse of power. Just another example of how lame NYC has become.

[Sam Salinitis]

02:00 PM on 04/10/2011

good that neighborhood sucked for the past decade....when every bar tries to artficially create what was once a great place to spend the weekend with the cheezy bars that attract the plastic vermin who ruin just about everything that is cool.....velvet ropes, attitude, and fakeness is what kills this neighborhood. Kent avenue with all those empty condos LOL what were they thinking putting a duane reade AND a cvs on the same block? sheesh ....Williamsburg RIP another neighborhood subjected to mainstream cheezeballs.....

[Richard Rossmassler]

12:34 PM on 04/09/2011

moratorium is over kill
just rescind licenses of the worst offenders

a bar can be a good neighbor
as long as they act like one

one of the great aspects of our neighborhood
is the booming food movement
we have some of the best restaurants in the city
these places will not open without a license

there are dozens of restaurants in the works
all of which are investing 100's of thousands of dollars in the neighborhood
their projects are already underway and this would pull the rug right out from under them
to do this would literally cripple their projects and wipe out their investments

a moratorium would also hurt property owners who have commercial spaces
to eliminate new restaurants from the neighborhood
would reduce the rents of property owners storefronts
due to the restricted uses of their spaces

the moratorium is a bad idea
just issue licenses on a conditional basis
that the operators perform in a responsible manner
if they can't be good neighbors
then rescind their licenses

-rich
16 yr. resident of hope street

[bar1ed]

10:20 PM on 04/08/2011

Somebody did'nt get payed off!

[rikster]

08:33 AM on 04/11/2011

you got that right....!

[Montesquieu MM]

07:15 PM on 04/08/2011

Executive Committee of CB1 Brooklyn message to the world: Hipsters leave now!