Divided board OKs license for embattled bar

David Cook says he has changed.

His neighbors don’t buy it.

But a majority of the Fredonia Town Board did on May 14 and voted to grant a liquor license for his Little Kohler Haus.

The license for the embattled bar lapsed last June 30 and Cook didn’t file paperwork fast enough to renew. That July, the bar was raided by sheriff’s deputies and the state Department of Revenue who found receipts that showed he was still selling liquor.

Cook pleaded guilty in January for serving alcohol without a license, a misdemeanor, in exchange for dismissal of a charge of buying liquor for commercial distribution from a retailer.

Two people living in campers on the bar’s property died from drug overdoses in the last couple of years. One was a woman who tended bar and had nowhere to go and the other was a man in between apartments. Cook said he didn’t know either used drugs.

The Town Board denied renewing the license three times. But two new supervisors and a new chairman were elected in April. Cook applied again.

Neighbors at last week’s board meeting expressed concerns over granting Cook a license.

“There’s always garbage lying around. How can you give a guy a license that two people died in his backyard? And one is a bartender?” Steve Weyker, who lives across the street, said.

Bands play past the 11 p.m. stop time, patrons urinate outside and motorcycles burn rubber and pop wheelies in the street, he said.

“This is going to keep on going on. Give him a license, he’s going to do the same thing again,” Weyker said.

Weyker’s neighbor echoed those sentiments.

“The place is usually a mess. There is garbage around. I’ve been woken up very many times,” Roger Meyer said.

“His staff likes to crank the jukebox after hours when they’re cleaning up. You hear them dumping the bottles in the trash containers and talking and yelling back and forth. The place needs drastic changes. I don’t think he should ever get his license back, period.”

Jenny Strohmeyer, who ran unsuccessfully for town supervisor last month, said the bar makes more noise than the combined six bars in Newburg, where she used to live.

Bob Reimer, who lives next door to the bar, said, “You don’t know what’s going to happen next time. He does what he wants. You give him that license back, you give him his power to repeat.”

Cook said he will make changes and has developed a new plan of operations.

“I’m not going to allow no one on that front deck after 10 p.m.,” he said. “No more bands. I’ll be there, not next door in my shop working on cars like I was doing. I’ll manage the bar correctly.”

Cook also said he upscaled the menu to draw a different type of clientele.

The new license expires June 30. Cook will have to apply for a renewal. Both cost $300.

While some residents and elected officials were hoping to see the next month as a trial, town attorney Nathanial Jung said granting a liquor license is different than renewing one.

“This isn’t a trial period. Once you grant him this liquor license, he has a right to it. It’s substantially harder to take it away if something were to happen,” Jung said.

Supr. Jim Stemper made a motion to deny the license. He and John Depies voted for it. Newly elected Supr. Bob Eichner, after a 35-second pause, voted no, as did newly elected Supr. Steve Jentges after a short pause. Chairman Chris Janik has said he wants to give Cook another chance and voted no.

When a motion was made to grant the license, the vote fell along the same lines. Stemper and Depies voted no; everyone else voted yes.