A perseverant activist becomes the central figure in a resistance movement against Hermosa’s nightlife
“Habanera Sam” Sabra was hot under the collar.
He had opened one of his Amigos Tacos restaurants near Hermosa’s downtown, and while the burritos were selling like hotcakes, he was hurting for a license to sell the beer and wine that his customers could get at numerous nearby eateries, including the competing Mexican restaurant La Playita a few doors down the street.
Sabra had hit the same obstacle that numerous restaurateurs and proprietors of nightspots had bumped into for the past two decades: activist Jim Lissner, who was fighting Sabra’s application for a beer and wine license before the state Alcoholic Beverage Control. Sabra believed that, like many other times, Lissner would not win before the ABC, but his opposition would delay the granting of a license for as long as a year.
“I can’t survive. If I stay four more months I’ll go out of business,” Sabra said. “My rent is $6,500 a month.”
In his protest, Lissner sought a 10 p.m. closing time for the 2,200 square-foot Amigos, a ban on selling beer by the pitcher or wine by the bottle, and a limit to the number and size of TV sets, to guard against the eatery morphing into a sports bar.
“We don’t need any more sports bars. I think they are more likely to be a problem than a real restaurant,” said Lissner, a retired business owner with persistent concerns about crime and policing costs which he ties to Hermosa’s dense concentration of alcohol-serving establishments.
“It’s not fair,” Sabra said. “It’s a small, sit-down restaurant.”
He said he could not move Lissner, and so he agreed to have the conditions codified in his beer and wine license. In turn, Lissner said he agreed to drop his protest.
The point proved moot, when Sabra faced a second license protest from the owner of a neighboring residential building, and that turned out to be one he couldn’t shake. He tired of playing the waiting game, and three months later the business was closed.
“I try to communicate with people when I protest a license,” Lissner said. “I tell them, we are looking at these conditions; if you agree I will drop my protest, which I did with Sam,” Lissner said.
Although Lissner’s protest did not sink his business, Sabra remained bewildered about it.
“This Jim Lissner, he has to get a life,” Sabra said.
