I was at a meeting last night so missed the city council. I am grateful that councilor Kennedy brought this up last week after hearing from Chief Lavallee and councilor Martin made a motion to discuss this week. Story in today’s SUN.  council-unifies-downtown-crackdown



“The council voted unanimously to request that City Solicitor Christine O’Connor report on the feasibility of the council adopting ordinances based on Police Superintendent Kenneth Lavallee’s suggestions to the License Commission for addressing downtown disorder. Martin said Tuesday that some bar owners have expressed that they will only comply with new rules if they are forced to. “So we should make them,” said Martin.”


At a city council meeting in February Finbar Sheehan spoke eloquently on behalf of the 94% of responsible liquor licensed establishment owners that developed these best practices, now “rules”, and are already voluntarily in compliance.


It is hard to say if the License Commission could have dealt with a handful of irresponsible business owners or if the city does indeed need to establish ordinances to address specific issues. Either way Councilor Martin is correct that the tiny number of bars who will not comply with the rules should be forced to; so we should make them.

And then there are the more mundane everyday issues that need to be resolved and how you get business owners and residents to find common ground and a way to share a “mixed-use” space. It’s not rocket science (we leave that to John Noto) cities allover the country manage to find the balance. Almost 16 years ago when I moved downtown there were 4 bars, a few stores, lots of subsidized housing units and everything else was pretty much empty. There was an item at this weeks ZBA that caught my attention because it is something I completely overlooked at a resident. The application is for the owner of 104-110 Merrimack St. to convert the upper 2 floors of their building from commercial to residential condos. Why you ask? There is no elevator! After sinking a bundle of money into rehabbing the ground floor retail spaces; I imagine the owners can not afford to install an elevator (this was also an issue for Brian’s Ivy Hall, they had to prove they had access to the elevator in order to comply with ADA requirements before they were issued a permit). Speaking of BIH…these owners are going to build 3 new condos about 100 feet away from BIH. What could possibly go wrong! How to end the chicken-and-egg argument? Who was here first and who has “priority” the bar or the soon-to-be residents?

The Zoning Board of Appeals took a giant pre-emptive leap in the right direction; they issued the license to proceed but with the requirement that noise reduction measures are included in the plan. The owners’ architect, Mr. Jay Mason, agreed that the city established noise ordinance for DMU of 50 decibels could certainly be achieved.

I’m quietly pausing right now in honor of the logic of this decision… Instead of spending so much time arguing and pointing fingers about who should have done what when whoever was building whatever… let’s say going forward we: 1. Identify ways to balance the needs of those already here 2. Before developing new projects make sure to consider what mediation measures are necessary in a mixed-use area for things like noise, recycling, access, etc. and make them conditions for development whether business or residential. Burden-sharing!