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Wednesday, May 16, 2012
Burgers and wings spot to take Aura's spot on J Street
by Brandon Darnell, published on May 6, 2011 at 5:40 PM
Storyline: Local Business
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BarWest Burgers & Wings will be taking the place of Aura on J Street in Midtown, and in addition to food, it is bringing a sense of cooperation with a local neighborhood association that has filed complaints for previous bars in that area, including the now-closed GV Hurley’s.
The opening day is tentatively set for mid-July. Co-owners Trevor Shults and Todd Zancaner are teaming up with local restaurateur Randy Paragary, for whom Shults worked in numerous positions – most recently in marketing.
Shults said he has always been a fan of the block that contains Centro Cocina Mexicana, Red Lotus and Harlow’s, so moving into the two-level spot at 2724 J St. was a “no-brainer.”
“It will be affordable, sit-down dining,” he said. A burger with a 3-ounce patty – similar in size to In-N-Out Burger’s patties – will start at $3.95, and a double will be $6.
Five sandwiches, five salads and a vegetable burger round out the menu, which is still being finalized.
Thirty types of wings will also be on offer, and one of the highlights of the 4,300-square-foot space is its second floor, which Shults said can be rented out for banquets, business meetings, birthday parties or any number of occasions.
He said it will accommodate 30 people in a sit-down configuration or 70 standing.
One essential aspect of opening a restaurant on the 2700 block of J Street is working with local residents.
“In Midtown, the only way you’re going to survive is if the neighborhood association supports you,” he said.
The Marshall School/New Era Park Neighborhood Association has a long history of battling with businesses on the block, with concerns of rowdiness and noise levels, according to board co-chair Mark Hefling.
“It’s been an issue adding restaurants to that block in the past,” Hefling said.
Former co-chair George Raya said loud parties as well as the noise of all the bars emptying into the street on Friday and Saturday nights has been a problem.
But both Raya and Hefling said the cooperation between the association and BarWest has been very positive.
In going through the process of obtaining a liquor license, BarWest owners were encouraged by the Alcoholic Beverage Commission to cooperate with the neighbors, Hefling said.
Several concessions were made to get the neighbors on board – including agreeing not to apply for an entertainment permit through the city and bolting down tables on the ground floor so they cannot be cleared for a dance space, as was previously done when Aura occupied the building.
An eviction notice dated March 21 was on the front door of Aura last month, and The Sacramento Press was unable to reach the former owners or property management.
After contacting more than 70 area neighbors, Hefling said the association has not heard any opposition.
Hefling said the neighborhood association is representing two disparate groups – residents who have been in the area for 25 years or more and relatively new residents who moved to Midtown after the transformation of the area over the past decade.
To that end, he said, the association is trying to find a happy medium between those who want a quiet central city atmosphere and those who like having bars and restaurants – many of whom work in those bars and restaurants.
Hefling said the owners of BarWest have been easy to work with, and he believes they are honest people who will continue to work with the association.
When the restaurant opens, Shults said it will be open until midnight on weekdays, with a 2 a.m. closing time on Saturday and Sunday morning for the late-night crowds Friday and Saturday.
There will be 15 TVs on the walls, and BarWest will be carrying all the DirecTV packages so patrons can watch sports, but he said it won’t be a sports bar.
The décor will be casual, and there will be signature cocktails, but he didn’t have details on them yet.
“We’re really in the design phase right now,” he said. “We’re really just excited to offer a great burger, great wings, a great atmosphere and 14 beers on tap.”
A website and Facebook page will be created in the future. Check back in the conversation below for information as it becomes available.
Brandon Darnell is a staff reporter for The Sacramento Press. Follow him on Twitter @Brandon_Darnell.
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1. BarWest is not located within the boundaries of Marshall School Neighborhood Association. Its boundaries end at the north side of J. While residents closest to the long troublesome 2700 block, have been greatly and adversely impacted by customer misbehavior leaving those clubs, the residents to the south have also.
Those residents live within the boundaries of the Midtown Neighborhood Association, and BarWest too is located within the MNA area boundaries. Members of that association and its board members, to whom I’ve spoken, say that to their collective knowledge neither Barwest nor Hefling contacted residents and or any board member. They should have been contacted.
2. “In Midtown, the only way you’re going to survive is if the neighborhood association supports you,” he [BarWest] said. It is unfortunate that someone misinformed the owner(s) about this. It is residents, near and far, who are businesses’ customers. A neighborhood association has no buying power. Any business is dependent upon those residents.
Further, when it comes to alcohol licensing, Alcohol Beverage Control (ABC) recognizes only residents as having a constitutional right to the “quiet enjoyment of property, ” which has been interpreted by the courts to cover much more than sound. ABC’s governing codes do not designate neighborhood associations as “people.”
He fails to mention that those residents have long supported restaurants, which serve good food with beer, wine or cocktails. They have opposed some bars/clubs because of a few but repeated drunken customers’ misbehavior in front of or next to their homes.
It is true unfortunately that past new owners of bars/clubs masqueraded as restaurants in the early hours but then misled residents as to what they said they were going to be later in the evening. Having been misled before, residents with whom I’ve spoken fear that could happen again in this case.
4. He also misunderstands or misrepresents what both longtime (“25 years or more”) and newer property owner residents want as to quality of life in their neighborhoods. I know both and both agree that they want three very basic courteous and simple things:
(1) bar/club customers should respect residents’ properties;
(2) bars/clubs should provide parking for their customers instead of forcing customers to park in adjacent neighborhoods where they take up residents’ parking spaces; and
(3) bars/clubs and their customers should respect the fact that many of residents are raising their children in these neighborhoods and ask that inebriates returning to their parked cars behave as they would at home where they were raised.
5. Hefling does a disservice to all Midtown businesses and residents and widens the gap between the two when he talked to “70 residents” and then apparently pitted longtime residents against newer by saying that the difference between the two are those who want “quiet central city atmosphere and those who like having bars and restaurants.”
That is not a true assessment. The truth is that in addition to asking respect for their quality of life and their children and proving customer parking, many residents want to be able to walk safely to and from restaurants, and like to have drinks in bars and like to attend bands or other performances in the nightclubs.
6. The new BarWest owners send mixed messages. Its name sequence BarWest Burgers and Wings is one. It suggests alcohol services are first and food services are second. Their proposed closure time of midnight during the week and 2:00 a.m. on weekends is another, and they have been unwilling to change those.
Such hours are not normal restaurant hours but are typical of bars. In addition, Brandon reports that owners had already made “several concessions” by agreeing not to apply for an entertainment permit. In fact, owners told a resident in a meeting that the landlord required a clause in their lease that they were not to apply for entertainment permit and bolting the tables to the floor may very well have been part of that requirement. What other “concessions” to residents have they made?
While certain types of entertainment, such as dancing, are specified in the cities’ ordinance the number of TV screens, which we all watch for entertainment purposes are not. The cost for installing and operating 15 to 20 such screens plus stocking and serving 14 kinds of beers suggests more far more than dining pleasure.
At this point BarWest has not filed for an alcohol license. When it does, residents will follow the process ABC codes provide them to obtain operating conditions, which protect resident’s constitutional right to quiet enjoyment of property. Hopefully, BarWest will follow through with agreeing to those conditions, which will focus on being a restaurant and not a bar.
It has long been the unwritten understanding of Midtown neigbhorhood associations, the neighborhood association nearest an issue, or most effected by an issue, takes the lead in a neighborhood response. ie. Sutter Hospital expansion - Midtown Neighborhood Association; Rite Aid Pharmacy, 2211 F Street - Boulevard Park Neighborhood Association; McKinley Village - Marshall School-New Era Park Neighborhood Association.
In 2007, our neighborhood association coordinated the filing of 94 individual neighbor objections to the granting of a liquor license to G. V. Hurley's. ALL 94 objections were my residents of Marshall School. Neither Midtown Neighborhood Association (then known as Winn Park Capitol Avenue Neighborhood Association), or Boulevard Neighborhood Association, or residents of those area, filed any objections or spoke up at all. Now, all of a sudden to ask BarWest to meet with Midtown Neighborhood Association if a MAJOR surprise! Hey, it's a free country, everyone is allowed to express an opinion. But, let us not be unreasonable when asking businesses to meet with ALL neigbhors. I live one-half block from BarWest. My upstairs neighbor and my next door neighbor likewise live less than a block from BarWest.
Thanks for your comments. I just want to add some clarification. Not everything discussed when I spoke to Raya and Hefling can possibly be in the article, and the statements about older residents vs. newer, younger residents were, in part, a simplification of a much longer conversation. Neither Hefling nor Raya made it seem as a war between two age groups.
The distinction they made was with a set of residents who, in a large part, were here before there were entertainment and bar spaces on that block and another set of residents that have, in many cases, moved in since then and naturally did not see the neighborhood change.
Also, I put the mention of the 70 residents near the discussion of the two groups of residents. It was not a natural link made by Hefling, but where I thought the information most made sense.
If I understand Mr. Kooyman's comments correctly, it was wrong of the Board from the Marshall School/New Era Park Neighborhood Association (the Board) to reach out to the residents that are most closely impacted by the new business at 28th and J Street when the Board received the news of the new business - Bar West Burgers and Wings. It was wrong to gather the thoughts and opinions of those residents first. It was then wrong to listen to what the new business owner plan for the space. It was also then wrong to pass along that information to all of residents on our email list and to post information on our Facebook page at Marshall School/New Era Neighborhood Association (be sure and check us out). If this line of thinking continues, then it will be wrong for the new business owners and residents to come together and have discussions about residents' concerns. I guess it is much more "effective" to create a hostile and contentious interaction from the beginning so that way we can waste as much city and state tax dollars as possible having the Sac. Planning Dept., Councilmember Cohn, and Alcohol Beverage Control (ABC) mediate possible disputes instead of allowing businesses and residents to try to work together first. It is probably just easier to assume the worst. There are fewer people to consider with that approach.
Also, there are actually several residents that live within the boundaries of Midtown Neighborhood Association that follow the updates on the Marshall School/New Era Neighborhood Association (please check us out). The email address for the new business was provided with the request that residents with concerns contact the business owner directly. Also, the owners of Bar West were notified that a residential building is located on at 28th and K Streets. It was suggested they should reach out to that building as well.
George Raya and Mark Hefling were authorized by the Board to speak with Sacramento Press regarding Bar West. Mr. Raya has been an invaluable resource in mentoring and guiding the Board as to how to proceed down this path. We value his counsel and input. As for Mr. Kooyman's comments regarding any potential conflict of interest by Mr. Hefling. I personally find those comments inappropriate. The Board is well aware of Mr. Hefling's employment background and finds no conflict exists. Also, there is no need to "school" me on the notion of a "conflict of interest." As a legal professional, I am well aware of the concept. If that issue were to arise in the future, resources will be made available to the Board to more objectively brief this issue. I personally find Mr. Kooyman's attempts to discourage Mr. Hefling's participation in our neighborhood association both puzzling and disappointing.
I personally welcome the opportunity to work with other neighborhood associations. Improving communications between our neighborhoods will only make our community stronger. I do, however, find "shouting" at each other in emails or on-line forums not a particularly beneficial way to communicate with each other. Perhaps that is how it has been done on the past but that seems ineffective and unproductive in my humble opinion.
I would like at the City to figure out how many tax paying dollars have wasted during the last 25 years with these obstructionist ideas. I wonder how much of this "business as usual" contributes to the budget deficit our City faces. How much time is sucked up by the City Council, the Mayor's office, and the City of Sacramento staff entertaining the never ending list of objections from the "usual suspects"? You would think that with 25 years experience with neighborhood issues that the "usual suspects" would have found a way to create consensus and compromise like our neighbors in East Sacramento. I would at least like it if the City Staff and business community would challenged the "usual suspects" to come up with positive solutions, compromise, and civility.
I've been following Sacramentopress.com for awhile and only see negative ideas and complaining from the "usual suspects." This neighborhood is continuing to evolve. If you can't evolve with it then maybe you have outlived your time here. Midtown isn't for everyone. It will never be the quiet, bucolic suburb that you would like it to be. Try talking with real estate agents from all over the region and they will tell you that Midtown is coming into its own.
My advice - - try a little "kumbaya" to create some good will with the businesses (and your neighbors) and maybe they will work with you. First you attack the businesses and now you attack your neighbors for trying work with the businesses. Exactly who are you saving Midtown for and from? Midtown property values have closed the gap with East Sacramento over the last 15 years. Hmmm, could it perhaps be the expansion of restaurant choices and cultural attraction such as Second Saturday that might have contributed to the upswing? People want to live here for the exact things you are trying to kill. Once again, who are you trying to save Midtown for and from?
Instead of creating a collaborative, cooperative environment, Mr. Kooyman is bent on personally attacking a member of our neighborhood (Mark Hefling). He is also trying to discredit the efforts of the Marshall School-New Era Park Neighborhood Association to spread the truth about projects in this neighborhood. Exactly who are you trying to save Midtown for or from?
I am tired of Midtown Business Association and their friends, Mark and Julie trying to turn my neighborhood into a party house.
I appreciate your insight and would love to know, as a new resident, what drew you into living in Midtown?
Also if you have any suggestions for the site, it's comment system, or any other feature you think the site could use, please let me know by emailing suggestions@sacramentopress.com.
I genuinely hope the best for the bar/restaurant and look forward to personally giving it a go when the doors open.
Oh, and I am also a real person, who is not a plant affiliated with either of the groups that seem to be warring on this thread.