We were informed by a neighbor of this hearing (not by the tavern itself – though we are listed with CB3 as a local community organization and this establishment is on the park):
Item #7. Cafe Henrie (Downtown Cafe LLC), 110 Forsyth St (aka 114 Forsyth St) (upgrade to op)
View the applicants questionnaire answers here. Application below.
op means full liquor license – unlike a beer and wine license.
SLA & DCA Licensing Committee: Meets:
Monday, July 17 at 6:30pm — Public Hotel – 215 Chrystie Street (btwn Houston & Stanton Sts)
Generally we oppose additional liquor licenses surrounding the Park especially locations that have never been licensed before (the license stays even if the bar fails).
- Our Park is already well endowed with op licenses. New hotels with lots of OP licenses. (Around the corner on Broome is the former Happy Ending – which was anything but – for this neighborhood). Took a long time and many sleepless nights to remove them.
- Liquor licensed establishments tend to drive other small businesses out – landlords often prefer the more lucrative alcohol establishments to a bodega, a shoe repair, tailor or barber. Businesses that serve our neighborhood.
- This one is 200 feet from a Church (see 200 foot rule below)
- We have a songbird sanctuary across from this site.
- We have 7 high schools, one Middle School and one Pre-School on Forsyth Street that line this park.
- We have a burgeoning homeless population that is often heavily addicted to drugs and alcohol.
- There is no ‘public benefit’ that offsets the difficulties these op licenses bring to the majority of the neighborhood.
We have supported licenses when their main function is not to get people drunk. When the entity offers a public benefit as their key mission (like Dixon Place with the arts) or when stipulations are all we can hope for to curb excesses.
No matter what, new licenses mean the public must become the watchdogs of bars and clubs. We think we have better things to do with our time.
