Tensions Sky-High Between Downtown Residents, Revelers

Tensions between downtown residents who are cranky over lost sleep and the area's booming bars and restaurants are reaching a flashpoint in advance of a public meeting over the conflict, tonight at the Public Theater, near Astor Place.

Yesterday, community advocates scored a victory when the State Liquor Authority rejected an application for a liquor license for the highly touted East Village gastropub EU. Owned by the filmmaker Robert Giraldi, EU has been waiting months to open on East 4th Street after shelling out for an expensive build-out and a well-known chef.

The district manager of Community Board 3, which covers the East Village and the Lower East Side, Susan Stetzer, said she devoted about 20 hours to blocking EU's license.

"Go to Avenue B at night, go to Orchard Street at night. People have not slept through a weekend night there in over a year," Ms. Stetzer said.

Some property owners are fighting back. Last month, one NoHo landlord sued her neighbors and a community leader for $5 million for actions she claims led to the rejection of a liquor license for a proposed bar in her building.

Tonight, area residents will have a chance to vent their frustrations over the density of bars and restaurants, land use, and traffic issues, in front of several elected officials, including the president of Manhattan, several City Council members, assemblymen, state senators, and representatives from the SLA. Several high-ranking officials from the Bloomberg administration also will be present.

The city appears to be responding to complaints about noise with increasingly aggressive policing tactics. Deputy Inspector Dennis De Quatro of the 9th Precinct has come out publicly against bar noise and testified before the SLA against EU's license, according to Ms. Stetzer.

A lobbyist for the Nightlife Association, Robert Bookman, said that increasingly aggressive policing tactics amount to harassment of legitimate business owners.

"I think they are seriously out of control as it relates to nightlife," Mr. Bookman said. He said the process of getting a liquor license here is more arduous than in other cities.

"You are trying to open a nightclub in an area zoned for nightclubs, and you would think they are talking about opening a brothel," he said.

The lobbyist said that the smoking ban, which forces revelers onto the street to light up, and changing neighborhoods are to blame for the increasing complaints.

"What's new is that people are spending millions of dollars to live in these areas. Now they are waking up, and they are shocked - they're in a district that allows late-night use," Mr. Bookman said.

One of the organizers of tonight's meeting, Zella Jones, of the NoHo Neighborhood Association, said only bars and restaurants can afford the area's high rent for retail space. She says the city should encourage a diversity of ground floor retail spaces with tax incentives.

"If we are dependent on every ground floor space being a bar or restaurant, and we are going to rely on the tourist trade to fill them up, how much are the tourists going to drink?" Ms. Jones said.