Business & Tech

Sports bar, neighborhood reach deal

NPU-C supports liquor license application for new Stooges owner

The sports bar Stooges and the Springlake Park Homeowners' Association made peace Tuesday night at a sometimes testy NPU-C meeting.

The NPU voted to support new owner John Scarminech's request for a liquor license if he and the neighborhood agree within 10 business days to a memorandum of understanding on a number of improvements.

Scarminech said he's already made most of the improvements, including noise reduction measures, better security and ridding the bar of unsavory characters with the help of the Atlanta Police Department. He said that he needs to make one final payment to the previous owner of the bar to take full control of the business, along with receiving his liquor license. Citing his background in running restaurants, Scarminech also said he'd improved the food at Stooges.

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Still, neighborhood representatives Clark Gore and Tom Sabulis, while acknowledging Scarminech's improvements, remained concerned that the bar would continue to play loud music, disrupting the neighborhood, with homes sitting directly behind the bar. 

Sabulis said that since taking over the bar, Scarminech had begun live bands, disruptive to young families. The sound, including a throbbing bass, "keeps them up all night long."

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Scarminech said that he'd gotten rid of a DJ and that live music would stop, at least temporarily, during football season when Saturday nights will be filled with college fans watching their favorite teams. He also said the bar is improving its sound proofing, and that he'd put in a system to limit the decibel level.

At the suggestion of NPU Chairman Paul Melvin, the neighborhood and the bar reached their agreement allowing the NPU to give its support to the liquor license application.


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