City Council Member Jan Drago proposed a few potentially major changes to Mayor Greg Nickels's nightlife licensing ordinance last week. The biggest: doing away with the controversial license altogether.
"I'm not convinced that the problems and the issues [posed by] nightlife can be solved by licensing," Drago said at a meeting of the council's neighborhoods committee, chaired by Sally Clark, on May 3. The mayor's proposal would require all bars and clubs to obtain a $300 license annually. Among other new restrictions, Nickels's proposal would require club owners to monitor the area in and around clubs for crime and litter and to impose new noise restrictions. If a club violated the ordinance, its license could be revoked.
Drago's amendments, which have not been formally drafted, would attempt to get at the problem of nuisance violations by instituting, in Drago's words, "a series of escalating fines, penalties, and restrictions" for violating the city's noise and nuisance ordinances, and by establishing "civilian enforcement" (dangerously empowered neighbors?) during the hours clubs are open. Currently, enforcement is done primarily by police (who can be intimidating) and the Department of Planning and Development (which operates from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.). "Our enforcement is fragmented among agencies and not on the street when it's needed," Drago said.
The council has struggled with the question of how to enforce nightlife regulations without imposing a new layer of licensing on businesses that are already subject to licensing from the city and state, and without unnecessarily burdening bars and clubs. Clark's office says they've only had repeat complaints about a handful of clubs, including El Chupacabra in Greenwood, Venom and Tabella in Belltown, and Waid's in the Central District. 
