Mars Bar

There has been a lot of moaning and groaning about the upcoming demise of local favorite haunt the Mars Bar. (note that the link to NY Magazine lists it as a "critics pick!")

However, one thing that nobody laments is the 2002 discontinuation of the Mars Bar, the candy, which was one of my favorites. My grandmother always kept one in her freezer for a snack. She would slice it with a knife and dole out little pieces of deliciousness. Then I would go out and buy my own, and eat it like a normal person, right there in the candy store.

Mars Bars are no longer available in the U.S., though they can still be found in the U.K. I saw one for sale recently in a West Village deli for $2.00, priced like an import. Remember when imported records were the thing to have, and they had that special sticker on the plastic? Now you can have an imported Excel file, which doesn't have the same cache.

Some websites claim that the Snickers Almond replaced the Mars Bar, which I have just found out and have yet to try. And to answer all those annoying people who keep saying to me, "isn't it the same as Milky Way?" the answer is "no it is not." Mars Bars had nuts, Milky Ways don't. I am morally opposed to candy without nuts.

This guy is pissed that they made their Australian Mars Bars smaller. Well, at least they didn't make them disappear completely, as they did here.


Onwards...

Conflict of Interest

As you may remember, last week I was all hot and bothered about a meeting I attended at my local Community Board. One of the issues I pondered about was the conflict of interest of bar owners serving on the board who are allowed to vote on policy that, by their own admission will impact the value of their business (fact point: only one of the three on the committee who were present phrased it in such clear terms).

At tonight's full board meeting where the vote was scheduled to take place on the recommended new policy of the committee, it was announced that in fact the conflict of interest city attorney (or some such fancy title) ruled that they should not be allowed to vote on this one issue, but they were allowed to participate in all discussion.

In the end, it turned out that the "transfer" policy in contention, as advocated by the bar owners, was rolled back, by vote of the full board. The bar owners wouldn't have had the votes anyways so appealing the decision on their votes won't matter. One thing I did notice was if they hadn't spent so much energy arguing about "being gagged" they might have spent more time making a stronger case for their ideas.

And so we travel onward...

One More Thing

The Lo-Down has an excellent recap of the meeting this week at the Community Board regarding their attempts to change of policies and procedures on how liquor licenses are approved. Read here.

And in case you don't read all the way down, they are voting to approve that transfer licenses for existing bars and restaurants be transferred with no additional review of stipulations, in perpetuity based on the location of the business. That means (as I read it) that unless a bar owner loses his or her license based on infractions (rare, very rare), there will always be a license in that location, forever. And only in Community Board 3, as no other community boards abide by this same rule.

Stark Raving Mad

Last night the community board held their final open meeting about revising their policies on liquor license approvals. It is now 24 hours later and I'm still stark raving mad about the whole thing. I could only stay for an hour due to a Chinese food commitment that, if broken, would have brought bad luck for at least another year. So I can't tell you how the meeting ended, only how it started, which is badly....

... when I got yelled at for cross talking, when in fact it was my turn to speak and I was defending myself against a bully who was trying to shout me down.

I would like to ask the question of the public: is there another kind of business besides restaurants and bars that is allowed to traffic in state or city issued licenses for profit? Taxis? Hot dog vendors? I honestly don't know how those licenses work but am curious to know if this is status quo for all licensed ventures, or just liquor licenses. Doctors can't sell their license. I can't sell my drivers license, but is that only because there is no market for it, or because it is frowned upon? This is a burning question.

As a non-politician, and merely an interested citizen, what is so stunning to my innocent self, is that people who have a financial interest in profiting from the rules of how liquor licenses are approved for recommendation by the Community Board (they don't actually approve licenses, only make a recommendation to the SLA), also have a vote in how those rules will be created. They say they've been over this with the lawyers, but I still can't wrap my mind around it. I believe it is the very definition of cronyism.

The issue is thus (very briefly, it's much more complex): the bar owners are insistent that when applicants are buying a liquor license from an existing owner, the community board ought to approve the "transfer" without much review, ie a rubber stamp. The reason for this is because if they apply any stipulations (close their windows by 10pm or no live music) then that reduces the value of how much the owner can sell their liquor license for. That is because when restaurants and bars fail, they can get upwards of $100,000 for their liquor license if they can find a new sucker to buy it, and suckers there are aplenty. So they are rewarded for failed businesses, supported by the policies of the community board. I cannot think of another business that gets this benefit, based on having a state-issued license in your pocket. A guarantee of big money, even if you fail. Supported by our community board, all our elected officials, and the state liquor authority. Which does make me think that there must be something I'm missing, I just don't know what it is. I seek enlightenment.

In short, the bar owners, who are members of the community board, have a vote on making this policy, which has an impact on the value of their liquor licenses. Huh?

So there are two issues: one, a state issued license can be sold and bought right in the open air, not underground, under the table, or out of sight, right there in broad daylight. And second, a member of the community board whose business is impacted financially by the decisions made by the board, can vote on these issues. Not only do they have power to keep the value of the licenses inflated, but they can also, in effect, choose their competition with the power they have to approve or deny license recommendations.

I'm not sure I'm explaining this clearly, but if you read this far, thanks for listening, I'm still kind of ranting about it because I'm some kind of crazy nutjob who thinks things should be fair, when I know, I know they are not.

Commenters, if you are so inclined, please be polite or I will delete you. Cross talking and intelligent conversation is allowed, personal attacks and hate is not.

News Travel Fast

Last night I attended our Community Board meeting to speak about my opposition to a new liquor license on my block. Without going into details which are not relevant to this story, I wanted to illustrate my point that my experience with their management had not been positive, and that I had reservations about how they would handle a potential crowd of drinkers. To that end I told a true story about a run in I had with one of the managers in front of their restaurant where his response to me was to curse me out in a rather vicious way.

Before I even got home there was an email waiting for me from a local blogger asking me about the story. It was a colorful story, and according to him the room gasped when I told it. (I didn't hear the gasp because all I can hear when I'm speaking publicly is my heart racing.) News travels fast. Watch what you say.

Where To Go To Get a Drink

Here...
And what tops the East Village? That would be Austin, Texas. I wonder if their Community Boards deliberate for half an hour for each liquor license.

(Note: the signmaker said the stats are from 2005)

The Fire Inside

The owner of trendy and wallet-sucking Chinatown bar Apotheke was arrested for lighting his bar on fire. Literally. I went there earlier this year and thought the bar fire was the only good part of the entire experience.

World Cup

Other bars were bursting at the seams for the big US-England World Cup game, with not a square inch left for breathing. But there was peace and serenity in that great old standby, Blarney Cove.

Does Being Quoted in the Huffington Post Make Me Famous?

Jeremiah so nicely included a quote from me in his article in today's Huffington Post. Because I have no editing capabilities I sent him pages and pages of thoughts, and he was able to choose but one of my gems. This is why he is a writer and I'm an office worker.

Know Your Barkeep

At yesterday's 9th precinct meeting I met one of the other owners of local jello shot hot spot Destination. I had no idea there were other owners besides the man I have been cautioned against calling anything but his given name, and not the word using the type of pork he advertised in the 1970's combined with a word that means "young man."

This other owner is Dan Maccarone, and we don't have a nickname for him. Yet. Dan has the appearance of a very young man, young enough that you think to yourself "he's too young to go to a bar never mind own one," but obviously he's older than he appears because he is also owner of a web design firm that shares its office in the Village Voice building with Curbed and Foursquare. An apparent triad of whiz kids attempting to take over the interwebs.

Last week the company I work for did a promotion with Jetsetter, and it turns out that Mr. Maccarone's company designed the Jetsetter website. I consider this a coincidence of gigantic proportions and only wish I knew about it before I met him so that I would have had something conversational to say to him.

According to Amateur Gourmet, Mr. Maccarone wanted to own a bar his whole life and Destination was a dream come true, despite the work they had to put in to make it usable. In this interview, he shares three lessons he learned about opening a bar in New York. The first lesson was about the ins and outs of New York politics, followed by a list of five additional lessons. Perhaps one of the things he didn't learn was how to count how many things he learned. This was the lesson I liked the most. And by recently adding a "late night menu" after nearly a year in business, they appear to be sticking to what they promised. (See here for what they promised.)

Community Board 3 is loathe to add any more bars to the East Village.
In the process of getting our approval, I watched other restaurants with just as much drive and excitement about their creations get rejected. Sometimes it was because their venues were too close to others. Sometimes people from the community were there to oppose any new venues on their streets. One community member was at the board meeting just to complain about another recently opened bar they felt was already causing trouble. If one thing was clear, we were going to have to stick to everything we promised the community board, because the only time anyone was going to put our name in front of them was to complain.

You can find out more about these three company's shared office and see their cafeteria-style space that looks like it would be like working inside a busy bar here.

If I was a real journalist I would have tried to interview him. But I'm not. Sorry.

VICTORY

Tonight's Community Board 3 SLA Committee meeting was possibly historic. The Upper Avenue A residents had such a strong turnout, and Dolores' pink signs made a dramatic impact when 24 people held them up to the astonishment of the room. Even the committee members were taking photos.

But signs are one thing, getting something done is another. And victory was the word of the evening. The northern part of Avenue A has been under siege by an incredible influx of bars, and tonight three more were on the agenda, plus a sidewalk cafe license. The end result, which is often a testament to stamina more than brains, was that nobody got their license approvals tonight, and one of the three bars withdrew their application in the face of so much opposition.

It's a funny thing that I find myself on this side of this argument. I love bars, I love restaurants, I love going out. One of the main reasons to have stayed here all these years is because I love the energy of the East Village. But there has come a moment in the past few years where the tipping point was reached, and the number of bars has outnumbered everything else. Instead of the diverse place I've lived for so long, our little streets have become a mecca of nightlife, a Temple Bar or Bourbon Street zone that is on the verge of being truly unlivable. 19 bars within 500 feet simply have to be enough to choose from.

So a GIANT THANK YOU to everybody that turned out. It was one crazy weekend of petitioning and emailing and running around, but it was well worth it. A special thanks to those who stayed until after 11:00 who didn't get to speak their turn (Susan that's you), the numbers that showed up proved that you don't fuck with 12th Street.

Photo credit: Eater.

Another Saturday Night in Mackerelville

When the bar Destination applied to get their liquor license as a transfer from the previous owner, Community Board 3 agreed to it with stipulations (read the original minutes from the Community Board meeting here:

Peace and Love Hospitality Inc., doing business as Destination, 211 Ave A (trans/op)
VOTE: To deny the transfer of a full on‐premise liquor license to Peace and Love Hospitality Inc., doing business as Destination, 211 Avenue A, unless the applicant agrees before the SLA to make as conditions of its license the following signed notarized stipulation that 1) it will operate as a full‐service restaurant, specifically a neighborhood grill serving American comfort foods to within one (1) hour of closing, 2) its hours of operation will be from 5:00 P.M. to 2:00 A.M. Mondays through Tuesdays, 5:00 P.M. to 3:30 A.M. Wednesdays through Fridays, 12:00 P.M. to 3:30 A.M. Saturdays and 12:00 P.M. to 2:00 A.M. Sundays, and 3) it will play ambient background music only.

Are they serving American comfort food until within one hour of closing? No. According to the waitress, they close the kitchen nightly at 10:00pm. Here is a picture of their kitchen at around 11:45pm. It was not in operation. Their website also states that they serve food until 10:00pm, so it's not a secret. The secret is that the stipulations imposed by the Community Board not only have no meaning or enforcement, there are NO repercussions. So bar owners know that they can come in, sign anything they are asked to, and they don't have to care after whether they had any intention of abiding by it.

Are they playing ambient music? Here is a video from around midnight tonight. Judge for yourself.