By Matt Flumerfelt
REMERTON — Residents, bar owners and employees alike turned out in numbers to participate in last night’s Town Hall meeting to discuss the revised alcohol ordinance. What started out as a discussion of the ordinance, however, soon turned into a discussion about law enforcement.
One business owner named Barbara stated, “I moved here in 1988. The Mill House by Chris Coleman had just opened up. We must have had a better class of drunks back then because we didn’t have these kinds of problems. The drunks have destroyed my property. Businesses are closing because they’re tired of smelling urine when they walk down the walkway, and tired of things being stolen if they dare to leave anything outside.”
Barbara stated that she stayed up one weekend night to see what went on around her business. She caught several people urinating on her property and one young man trying to force his way into her business. She also stated that a young man broke into her shop one night and “took a dump on the floor, leaving his underwear behind and the change that fell out of his pockets.” She said she opened her shop one Sunday morning and found an underage teenager passed out on the floor. “We thought he was dead,” she stated, “and had to call the ambulance.”
Mack and Gayle Primm, also local business owners, detailed the damage done to their property. Mack stated, “We come up here time and time again but nothing ever gets done.” Gayle Primm stated, “We remember when Remerton was a little Mill Town village, where you could put out planters with flowers in them. I can’t be up all night protecting my property because it’s not being protected by the city.”
Some of the bar owners and employees seem to be blaming the drunks for the problems, stating to the Council that if they have last call at 2 a.m., bar patrons will buy more drinks so they will have plenty to drink until they have to leave at 3 a.m. Colin Roper, a student who works at Milltown Groove, stated that bar owners and employees can’t control what people do when they leave the bar.
Eric Saunders, owner of Charlie O’Corleys and Kevin Griffin, one of the owners of Milltown Groove, spoke in favor of the proposed 30 percent food sales requirement as long as businesses are given a chance to adjust to the changes. Saunders stated that during earlier work sessions, the percentage had been lowered from 50 percent to accommodate bar owners.
Council Member Sherry Wood suggested bar owners might hire private security on the weekends to help the Remerton Police Department, who are already doing all they can to enforce the laws inside the city. Chief Mike Terrell stated that at court the previous night they had 190 cases to process, including underage drinking, and open container violations, among others. “I can’t let my guys take the heat for not enforcing the laws. We do our part,” Terrell stated.
