Residents in Cabbagetown hope to shutdown a bar. ⇒
8 January 2007, late morning
A group of residents around Ossington and Bloor hope to do the same thing with a bar there. I question how effective this sort of thing really is.
This is a post from my link log: If you click the title of this post you will be taken the web page I am discussing.
I understand their frustration.
A few years ago, a bar opened next to my uncle’s store on Queen Street West of Landsdowne. Lowlifes gathered in front, hookers plied their trade behind my uncle’s store in his stairwell to the basement…he had to build a gate at the top of the stairs so that he wouldn’t have to clean up the condoms and needles he’d find there every morning…the dodgy patrons would block the door to his business and scare customers away from coming in…and I was scared for him, an aging man who speaks his mind.
His storefront glass was broken at least 4 times during the time that bar was open, by drunk and high patrons who just didn’t give a shit.
It’s not that it’s a bar…it’s what kind of patrons it attracts and encourages.
Now, there is another restaurant/bar next door, and there are no problems.
I don’t know how effective this kind of thing is, all I know is that if THAT bar had have remained open next door to my uncle’s store, he would have died of a heart attack by now.
Thank GOD, it was closed down after a raid, otherwise my family would have continued to worry about my uncle’s safety.
I say, close them if you can. And that’s only because I have personal experience with it. That bar cost my family thousands of dollars and months of grief and worry.
by radmila on January 8 2007, 9:46 pm #
Where did all the drunks and prostitutes and other destitute people go? I see how closing the bar would solve you uncle’s problem, but those people probably didn’t give up what they were doing just because their local bar was shut down. They probably became someone else’s problem. That’s why I don’t think it’s an effective solution. Shutting a bar down is a good first step I suppose. It can’t be the only step. My guess is that the Cabbagetown Neighborhood association will stop caring about this issue if the drunks disappear a few blocks away.
by ramanan on January 9 2007, 10:25 am #
I’ll be straight with you.
I don’t care where they went, as long as they weren’t next door to my uncle, harassing him, and scaring us and costing him his hard earned money with their careless destruction.
Honestly, they can go to hell for all I care. And communities need to keep doing this kind of thing until they take it to their own homes or stop their stupidness all together.
by Radmila on January 9 2007, 11:23 am #
The problem is they don’t go to hell, and I bet more often than not, they don’t go home (or have a home). They just go down the road, and become someone else’s problem.
There is a follow up to the original article about the hearing itself. It sounds like they are going to follow this whole hearing to completion.
by ramanan on January 10 2007, 10:29 am #
There are two more follow-ups to this article: A whole lot of trouble on the menu at Victor’s and Lining up to defend embattled Cabbagetown bar. The articles are an interesting look at how crime is handled in the city as well. One dealer is arrested 3 times in a row, doing the exact same thing: selling crack. How do you keep getting bail? Seriously. That dealer was from Markham too, not from Cabbagetown; he treks downtown to sell his wares. I get the sense this is quite common. The second article covers the defense's case, and is also pretty interesting.
by ramanan on January 15 2007, 2:21 pm #
And the next follow-up has been posted. It’s really interesting reading about this all unfold. As things move on, it’s clear the reporter backs the bar. I am tempted to side with the bar too, since I find yuppie community group obnoxious.
by ramanan on January 17 2007, 10:56 am #