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Police summon Boston bar and nightclub owners to meeting on patron safety

Boston Police Commissioner William Gross says a representative from every bar and nightclub in the city needs to attend a meeting this Tuesday to talk about how to keep patrons from being attacked, kidnapped and killed either inside or after leaving their establishments.

The meeting, set for 3 p.m. at the Boston Iron Workers Local 7 hall, 195 Old Colony Ave. in South Boston comes after one woman was kidnapped and then murdered after leaving a Theater District club and another was kidnapped and then raped after leaving a downtown bar.

Topics for the meeting will include "safety and well being of patrons, disturbances at closing time, security, dispersal of patrons and issues regarding the operation of licensed premises in the area."

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Comments

I am glad they are advocating for women (and possibly men) from getting assaulted and who knows what else. Usually it would just be a media frenzy and then turn a blind eye to it but it is great to see the commissioner forcing the representatives to come to the meetings. I hope they all showed up and stayed for the entire thing even if it were brief, I feel it is necessary. I was reading some dreadful comments saying how its a city so we should expect this thing to happen. Yes, to some degree there is danger with such a large population and nightlife but we should have increase in police presence, increase in training on "bar security", and increase on security in general like video cameras to help in situations like kidnapping and assaults and hopefully those crime numbers will go down.

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when the City allows these establishments to open until 4 am.

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(and yes, I know it's not strictly *legally* mandatory, but I'm sure it'll count against you before the licensing board if you don't show)

There are 1,110 licenses in Boston. Let's say it's an hour meeting, and it takes half an hour to get there, park, etc. and another half hour to get back to work. That's 2,220 hours. Let's say the average bar manager's fully loaded cost to the owner is somewhere around $50 per hour. Now we're talking a $111,000 meeting.

  1. If you had $111,000 to spend on public safety, is that really the next place you'd spend it?
  2. If the city wants to tell bar owners to do something, can't they just print it out and mail it to every license holder?
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If the city wants to tell bar owners to do something, can't they just print it out and mail it to every license holder?

No, because they'll blow it off. It's another piece of paper. There's no mandated action and no consequences for failing to comply. They're busy. They will blow it off. They'll scan the first half a sentence and throw it in the trash. But if you sit their asses down in a meeting and you say, "Here's what's been happening and here's what you can do to make your patrons safer"? They will learn something, and somebody's life may be saved.

And your numbers are bullshit. Not the numbers per se, but your sneaky accounting job in which you calculate the "bar manager's fully loaded cost to the owner" out to "a $111,000 meeting" and then posit the following absurdity: "If you had $111,000 to spend on public safety, is that really the next place you'd spend it?" As if a cost to 1,110 business owners somehow magically transfers itself to the public safety budget.

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What, exactly, is your objection to me characterizing this as a $111,000 meeting?

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What, exactly, is your objection to me characterizing this as a $111,000 meeting?

Quite clearly, none. Your assertion that that is somehow funds that would otherwise be spent on "public safety", however, is clearly horseshit.

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Point granted to the annoying pedant. Sir Hilldweller, your rebuttal?

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something needs to happen but I'm honestly not sure what the bars can do -- if somebody is willingly leaving with another person, can the bar intervene in that? maybe sobriety checks as people are walking out?

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People need to watch out for there friends. I know people should be free and safe to come and go as they please without be assaulted etc,., But the reality is the world is a crazy dangerous place. I see it periodically a single woman or man, but more importantly for a woman, leaving an UBER or LYFT ride stumbling drunk. That is just dangerous and reckless for others to not protect their friends.

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"To see the commissioner forcing the representatives"

"Here's what you can do to make your patrons safer"

"Sobriety checks as people are walking out?"

"That is just dangerous and reckless for others to not protect their friends."

Are we as a people honestly this allergic to independence and voluntaryism?

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