Chelsea’s Café will close at 10 p.m. this week, and live music has been canceled after the state office of Alcohol and Beverage Control took the restaurant’s liquor license. Judge Trudy White granted a temporary restraining order so the restaurant could continue selling liquor, but dissolved the injunction this morning after hearing arguments from both parties.
Chelsea’s owner David Remmetter and the ATC met this morning in a crowded courtroom filled with about a hundred young professionals, artists, Perkins Road overpass-area neighbors and attorneys to show their support of the restaurant.
Brian DeJohn, attorney for the ATC, says the time to get rezoning had lapsed and now Remmetter asked the court to step in to allow this “illegal operation.” “If it looks like a bar, acts like a bar, smells like a bar, it doesn’t matter what your numbers are,” DeJohn says of the ratio of food and liquor sales, which Remmetter had proven that he was in compliance. “You can’t thumb your nose at the system and ask for an injunction.”
Brian Brown, attorney for Chelsea’s Café, says Remmetter had every right to file the order, according to the letter of the law. Brown told the court he and his client went into the March 19 hearing with “a spirit of cooperation,” to see if they could resolve the problem and understand these “poorly written rules.” Brown says Remmetter paid his fees and brought evidence of his rezoning proceedings to the ATC office. “We can’t force the Metro Council into speeding up the process,” Brown says.
Remmetter defends his case to the ATC at a hearing scheduled for Monday. Read the complete story here.—Rebecca Breeden
Comments
Post a comment
(Requires free registration.)