Feature Story

By Ashley Toland Editor

ABC Board to tone it down some

By Ashley Toland

Editor

The Alcoholic Beverage Control Board is willing to change its attire, but not its stringent enforcement in downtown bars, most especially those with private club licenses, which allow patrons 19 years and older to enter as well as allowing the establishments to stay open after 2 a.m. on Sunday mornings.

The concession on changing their clothing came after Lagniappe reported on the “SWAT” style gear ABC agents were wearing as well as the “tactical” manner in which they were entering clubs during a recent downtown operation. These actions were alarming many patrons and hurting the bottom lines of these businesses, according to local bar owners, bartenders and patrons.

“I moved to downtown Mobile two years ago, and since then have become a regular at the OK Bicycle Shop. One of the reasons I like living downtown is the availability, within walking distance of my home, of a number of bars with professional staff where I can drink in safety and peace,” one patron wrote Lagniappe. “Because of this, I was surprised when, on a quiet evening several weeks ago, armed ABC agents wearing bullet-resistant vests entered the Bike Shop on an enforcement visit. If I had not known better, this high-visibility police presence would have indicated to me that something dangerous or illegal was going on. Patrons less familiar with the bar might easily have been discouraged from visiting again.

“While I appreciate the role of ABC agents in preventing underage drinking and other alcohol violations, I do not think their mandate should extend to annoying law-abiding bar customers. I will be less likely to visit downtown bars and restaurants if I am going to be subject to pointless ID checks and video surveillance.”

Lt. Michael Cook, director of the local ABC Board Enforcement Division, says they “wear what they wear” for safety, identification and organization purposes.

“We wear what we wear for a couple of different reasons. We had a shooting in a club, Atlantis, and we’ve had other shootings down there. And there’s a lot of things that go on down there that’s not in the club, and we’re not always in the club. But the biggest problem that we have is that we just wear this (pointing to his polo shirt with ABC logo on it), so we wear what we wear (bright red ABC T-shirts, with bullet proof vests over them), so people know who we are,” Cook said.

“If I go in a club and just have this (polo shirt) on, and I am walking through a crowd and bump into someone, they are going to turn around, and they are not going to see who we are, and they are going to want to fight. When we wear what we wear, they see who we are and they are like, ‘Oh, OK, I see,’ and they’ll get out of the way. It just helps us stay out of physical altercations inside the private clubs,” Cook explained.

But since these reports, they have decided to make some concessions on this policy.

“I talked to Chief (Jeff) Rogers (head of the state ABC Enforcement Division), and we are going to try and concede to a little bit of that since some of the problem is the raid vest look. We’re going to concede to a little bit of that because we have an undercarriage we can wear our shirt on the outside, but I hope what we don’t see when we wear our undercarriages that our physical altercations go up inside.

“Because now, most of the time, when they see that state police vest, even if they are really intoxicated, they will get out of the way. The vests help us, too, because they have pockets on them, so we can have things to write on, extra handcuffs and whatever we have to have.

“But I listened to their (bar owners) complaints, and since most of the licensees are in agreement it’s the raid tactical vests that upsets most people, we are going to concede to a little bit of that. Now, if the agents start getting in fights again, we will have to look at something different,” Cook said.

While they may look a little different the enforcement will remain the same. Cook says they are not going anywhere until the bars get into compliance, especially the private clubs, which have stricter regulations to follow and obviously are more laborious for the agents to enforce. Cook thinks many will switch these to lounge licenses when they are up again in October.

“We have got to get downtown in compliance. We will leave as soon as they do what they need to do. We ain’t going to go away, but we can focus our attention elsewhere,” he said.

Cook is quick to point out their more consistent presence downtown has helped, with the number of citations dropping from double to single digits.

Some of the “compliance” issues are what many of the bar owners see as harassment and entrapment. One owner was so distraught over this he brought City Councilman William Carroll to witness the “enforcement.” Carroll he said he was “very concerned” about what he saw and said their actions looked much more like “harassment” than “enforcement.”

Lt. Cook calls this “harassment” (like having undercover officers invert numbers on membership cards or ticketing a bartender for having two bottles of the same type wine open) just enforcement of the rules that he and his agents did not create.

Cook encourages bar owners to try and change the legislation at the city or state level and points out several municipalities in Baldwin County have already engaged in such action.

Ashley Toland is Lagniappe editor. Contact her at ashleytoland@lagniappemobile.com.

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