Crackdown needed on Ybor City clubs

By A TIMES EDITORIAL
Published June 21, 2007

Maj. Bob Guidara, who commands the Tampa police presence in Ybor City, gave the City Council a chilling report the other day on late-night crime in the entertainment district. The noise, the fights, the robberies and drugs pose such a threat on weekend nights that the city pulls cops from the nearby neighborhoods just to contain the danger. "I have exhausted our resources, " he told the council, adding later: "I have to applaud the efforts of the men and women of the district that are continuously subjected to these conditions, week after week after week."

The major's frustration stems from the city's problems with two megaclubs, Empire and Fuel. Authorities and Ybor residents say the hip-hop clubs are magnets for trouble. While serious crime in Ybor is down so far this year, police report 199 arrests at or in parking lots behind the clubs from October to June on charges ranging from murder and fighting to firearms violations. Drugs account for two-thirds of the arrests.

Ybor residents should not have to live in fear or put up with vandalism and harassment. Nor should the city so routinely put officers at risk merely because it refuses to force clubs to act responsibly. Drawing patrols from other areas to augment Ybor leaves thousands of residents vulnerable - many of them in neighborhoods already saturated with drugs and violence.

The city is considering several moves, such as forcing clubs to close earlier than 3 a.m. That's worth considering, but the benefit seems limited. What's to stop the party from moving off Seventh Avenue, or for the problems to kick in earlier than midnight, the typical start time the police see now? The city needs to seriously toughen the penalties for clubs that break the noise ordinance. Curbing the jacked-up party scene would help with crowd control. It also needs to hold clubs more responsible for what happens on their property or by their patrons. The council has wide latitude under city codes to suspend or yank liquor licenses for those businesses that constitute a nuisance, permit disorderly conduct on or near their property or repeatedly have "negative secondary effects" on their neighbors.

Police said Club Fuel had improved, and managers of Empire are scheduled to meet Monday with Ybor residents. The city, which will consider tougher steps this summer, also needs to examine what constructive steps it can take. Crime in the neighborhoods and in the nearby lots might be less of a problem had the city provided adequate, public parking along this stretch of Ybor. With a huge public stake in the old Latin Quarter, Tampa's premier tourist strip, the city needs to get a grip on late-night crime before this image eclipses further the reality that Ybor is usually a safe and pleasant place to visit.

[Last modified June 20, 2007, 21:57:27]