The year 2010 was marked by continued cooperation from Hermosa Beach nightspots to limit disturbances and other incidents, Police Chief Greg Savelli said. He added, however, that incidents requiring police responses have risen a bit over the past two years.
Nightspots, most of them in the downtown area, have often drawn criticism from neighboring residents for noise and rowdiness, and have gained unwanted attention in some Hermosa Beach City Council campaigns.
In the latter half of the last decade, police and City Hall bent their efforts to dampen the side effects of increased business at Hermosa’s downtown alcohol-serving nightspots.
Savelli and other officials met with owners of establishments to review the conditions of their city permits and state liquor licenses, and worked to enforce those terms, which can include hours of operation, hours of alcohol sales, or a ban on dancing. Police mounted what Councilman Michael DiVirgilio called a “surge,” saturating downtown-area neighborhoods with patrols around closing time.
City officials singled out three nightspots – the Shore and Blue 32 on Hermosa Avenue and the old Dragon on the Pier Plaza – for detailed reviews of their conditional use permits, then imposed restrictions such as earlier closing times.
Following all those efforts, calls for police service declined by a third in 2008, Savelli said.
Call for vigilance
As the city Planning Commission prepares to review nightspots to see whether any of them should be singled out for another round of permit reviews, Savelli said preliminary statistics for 2010 show only modest increases in worrisome incidents since 2008.
He said he did not foresee any establishments being singled out for a permit review, but stressed that decision will be up to the Planning Commission.
Savelli said the steep drop in incidents citywide in 2008 has been followed by small increases each of the last two years.
“Last year there was an increase over 2009, and 2009 was an increase over 2008. In my opinion it’s trending the wrong way. [Calls for police service] have been creeping up the last two years. I’d prefer them not to creep up,” he said.
“Everyone’s working with us. We have a cooperative relationship with the nighttime establishments,” Savelli said.
“The businesses just need to remain vigilant to monitor activity, and prevent disturbances and thefts, and we look forward to working with them to do so,” he said.
(Thefts of purses and cell phones pop up frequently on Hermosa police reports, and often alcohol-serving establishments are the locations.)
The breakdown
According to preliminary police statistics for 2010, Sangria was associated with the largest number of disturbance calls with 54, followed by Café Boogaloo with 39 and Sharkeez with 38.
Paisano’s was associated with 29 disturbance calls, Patrick Molloy’s with 24, Lighthouse Café with 23, 705 with 21, The Underground with 20 and Barnacles with 18.
Incidents leading to police reports were topped by Sangria with 24, followed by Sharkeez and Mermaid with 17 each, Patrick Molloy’s and Hennessey’s Tavern with 15 each, Café Boogaloo with 13 and The Shore with 11.
Café Boogaloo was associated with five assaults in 2010. Sharkeez and The Shore were each associated with three assaults, and all the other establishments had two or fewer.
One alleged sexual assault was associated with Sharkeez, and one was associated with the Poop Deck.
Sharkeez was associated with the largest number of thefts of property with nine. Patrick Molloy’s and Cantina Real were associated with seven thefts apiece, and the Lighthouse Café with six.
‘Accurate, not exact’
Savelli said the statistics can be modified based on the explanations of establishments that question the numbers. He said representatives of Sharkeez and Café Boogaloo have discussed the statistics with him.
Café Boogaloo representatives were unavailable before press time. Ron Newman, co-owner of Sharkeez on the Pier Plaza, said he believes his numbers will be modified downward.
“We do incident reports every day, so we know exactly what goes on. When [the Police Department] runs those sheets off, it’s the first go-round, and there can be some mistakes,” he said.
“Someone might phone in and say they lost their purse or cell phone, and they’re out in front of our place, and so they use that as the address, but it has nothing to do with us,” Newman said. “The police are doing their job, that’s just the information they have.”
Savelli said a nightspot might have a neighbor’s incident attributed to it on occasion, but might also benefit when its own incident is attributed to a neighbor. In addition, he said, police might respond to an incident such as a fight in the waiting line for a nightspot, and its staff might never become aware of the incident to record it.
“On average it all balances out,” Savelli said. “It’s accurate, but it’s not exact.”
Newman agreed that the nightspots are working to keep incidents down.
“Overall, everybody knows what the rules are, what their [conditional use permits] and liquor licenses say, and no one wants to get pulled up and have a violation,” he said. “Overall I’d say everyone is operating pretty well.” ER
