Nightclub Battles Heat Up

The city's Entertainment Commission is in the headlines again as part of the ongoing "War on Fun."

Turns out that San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, a former nightclub operator himself, has been appointing owners and employees of clubs to spots normally reserved for neighborhood activists.

Meanwhile, earlier in the week San Francisco Police Captain Jim Dudley, who recently lobbied against a liquor permit in North Beach, argued on a KQED program that the city would save more money on policing than it earns in revenue if it just shut all nightclubs down.

Dudley, along with Board of Supervisors President David Chiu, argue that the issuing of permits should be taken away from the Entertainment Commission and given back to the SFPD.

Meanwhile, the state board of Alcoholic Beverage Control apparently can't decided whether to allow or deny popular rock venue Bottom of the Hill's petition to be exempt from restrictions on how much booze business it can do.

Seems on both sides of the war on fun's battle lines, the fight is starting to get dirty.

Photo by Jerry Jarvis.

Jackson West would normally be pissed off by the political patronage, but more NIMBY neighbors frightens him.