Hermosa Beach to fund head-count checks at bars
The City Council is looking to crack down on late-night establishments that exceed their occupancy loads on the weekends. On Tuesday, council members approved $20,000 in overtime pay for the Hermosa Beach Fire Department to conduct checks of downtown establishments that might allow too many patrons on their premises after midnight. Fire Chief David Lantzer said his department needs the money to hire off-duty personnel to conduct the two- to four-man inspections that require having someone at each exit. “We’re doing this in response to some legal problems we’ve seen, with altercations, shootings, stabbings,” Lantzer said. “And these things are many times attributed to over-crowding, large crowds of people getting together. I think someone described it as someone can bump into somebody in a crowded area and all of a sudden it turns into this, you know, big fight. So overcrowding leads to these other problems.” The weekends are the busiest time for the city’s emergency services, with almost half of emergency responses happening between Friday and Sunday, according to a staff report. Lantzer’s preference is to schedule and pay off-duty HBFD personnel to enforce occupancy capacities…
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