Planning Commission Sours Sugar's Party

By Jorge Casuso

The Planning Commission voted Wednesday night to scale back the hours of a popular nightclub neighbors complained kept them up into the early morning hours.

The 5 to 1 vote called for Sugar, at 814 Broadway, to shut down at midnight -- instead of 2 a.m. Sunday through Thursday, but allowed it to continue to operate until 2 a.m. on weekends.

The commission also directed Sugar to present the city with a "sound mitigation plan" that would make noise inaudible to nearby neighbors and to institute a "good neighbor" policy that requires management to post signs and tell patrons to keep the noise down when they leave the club.

"When the doors close, there should be no noise audible," Amanda Schachter, principal planner for the city, said after the meeting.

Neighbors who showed up to testify greeted the decision with tempered enthusiasm.

"Given the situation, we've done well," said Chuck Allord, who heads Neighbors for a Safer Santa Monica, which represents residents in the immediate area. "The bottom line is we don't like this type of business in a residential neighborhood."

"If we could have it removed, we'd have it removed, but we can't," Allord said. "The bottom line is we have to scale it back as much as possible."

Allord said the neighbors are weighing their options, which could include appealing the decision.

He praised Commissioner Kelly Olsen, who cast the only dissenting vote after trying unsuccessfully to limit the club's operation to Wednesday through Saturday. Olsen and Allord argued that the late hours intensified the use of the club, which was previously a beer bar.

"All of the sudden it went from a beer bar to a night club," Allord said after the meeting. "When this went in, no one knew what we had."

Club owners were disappointed with the decision, saying the limited hours would make it difficult to continue to operate.

"We were certainly disappointed that the commission would not permit us to operate the hours that allow us to be a viable night club," said Jonathin Horn, one of the owners of the club. "We don't know what we're going to do. We're weighing the options."

Like the neighbors, the club's owners can appeal the decicion to the City Council.