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http://www.nationalpost.com/todays_....html?id=264952
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National Post
Saturday, January 26, 2008
Club district no party for fed-up residents
Downtown T.O.
Zosia Bielski, National Post Published: Saturday, January 26, 2008
Friday night in Toronto's Entertainment District: Under the floodlights and closed-circuit cameras that now watch over the troubled neighbourhood, a mounted police officer gallops down an alley, dispatched to yet another brawl.
Officers cluster at nearly every corner, patiently enduring the blustering machismo and insults of boozed-up young men. "F---the popo," one yells.
Along Pearl Street, three teens bellow "We're VIP," as one grabs at his crotch. On Peter Street, a driver with Goodfellas limo service politely asks a group of girls staggering into his car if they need vomit bags.
He grimaces when they decline the bags. Such is the controlled chaos of clubland circa January, 2008. At its peak, 67,000 revellers choke its streets and narrow laneways, with just 60 officers deployed to manage them. With 87 nightclubs jammed between Queen, Wellington, Spadina and Simcoe streets, it is the most densely saturated club district in North America. But by many accounts, these are the final days of clubland -- at least as many thousands of drunk teens have known it.
Condominiums are sprouting up across the neighbourhood, including Ivan Reitman's Festival Tower at the corner of King and John streets and another residence being built on the lot where the Joker nightclub once stood.
Residents are increasingly fed up -- and vocal -- as powerful stereo systems, brawls and gunshots routinely shake them from sleep. Police overtime is reportedly set to balloon to close to $2-million in the district this year, and local councillor Adam Vaughan has made it his mission to make club owners pay a portion.
Mr. Vaughan has declared war on club owners, and last month successfully prodded the Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario into joining a working group that will try to increase safety in the area.
''We're about to turn a corner, but it hasn't turned that corner yet,'' Mr. Vaughan says.
''It's been a crescendo of problems. The hope is it's peaked and we're about to get a handle on the situation. New development is taking care of some of the clubs -- new condos, property owners, residents, other businesses in the area, all these groups pushing for us to get a handle on the situation, and not wipe out the club industry but just make it safe for everybody, including the people going to the clubs.''
On the other hand, many revellers have grown tired of being corralled by police horses and told to shove off, especially after dropping thousands of dollars on VIP booths and bottle service.
"People don't like the hassle of police walking around telling you to get off the road," says Jeko Riapov, 23, a Scarborough construction business owner who says many local twentysomethings have abandoned the area in favour of a new district growing on King Street west of Spadina Avenue.
By all appearances, the original Entertainment District is a still a much sought-after weekend destination.
Last Sunday at 2:30 a.m., Richmond Street West was lit up like rush hour, lined with cabs, chartered buses and limos; the latter mostly ferrying teens in from the surrounding Greater Toronto Area, proving cheaper than cabs.
Police patrolling the neighbourhood say limos are creating two new problems: Fights are now erupting between groups of teens who line the sidewalks waiting for their limos at the end of the night. Police are also investigating limo drivers who are letting liquor flow in their cars, the result being teens who descend on the bars already drunk.
It is just one of myriad challenges facing officers in the area. Last year, police tallied at least 171 assaults and robberies, as well as two fatal shootings and one fatal stabbing.
This month, two Brampton men were charged with sexual assault causing bodily harm after a woman was violently attacked in the elevator of a Simcoe Street condo tower. Last April, a man was stabbed five times outside the DNA Lounge on Adelaide Street West. Two months later, three people and a police officer were stabbed after a fight broke out in a nearby parking lot.
Every weekend, 52 Division fills its 20 cells, sometimes overflowing to 55 Division. The men will remain locked up for at least four hours, or until they sober up.
"They'll go non-stop like they're out of their minds for two or three hours. We get teenagers to young adults to professionals," says Staff Sergeant Shaun Narine of 52 Division.
By many police accounts, the revellers are getting nastier. The bullpen, a bleak concrete room in the bowels of 52 Division, now routinely fills up with women: "cat fights" are a growing problem, says Sergeant Ed Lamch of the division's primary response unit.
He also says some party-goers have taken to attacking police horses, which now wear face shields.
Knives are an increasing concern, although only a handful of clubs have installed metal detectors, despite a recent bylaw amendment requiring all clubs to install detectors or equip staff with security wands.
On this Saturday night, Staff Sgt. Narine helps co-ordinate approximately 60 officers, including a bicycle crew and a nine-horse mounted unit. The first trouble spot is in the Duncan and Pearl streets area, where pubgoers start fanning out on to the streets earlier than clubbers just before last call.
Five men holler and lurch in the middle of the road. Nearby, a girl slides limply to the ground outside Grace O'Malley's.
"There's a few drunks wobbling around," radios Staff Sgt. Narine, requesting officers to the corner. Within minutes, six officers and two horses appear on the scene, quickly outnumbering the teens, who disperse.
Twenty-five minutes later, down a narrow laneway between industrial Victorian buildings, the mood tenses up. Outside This is London, Charles Khabouth's plush nightclub, a well-dressed man has been ejected for rowdiness: "I work hard! I have a $1,000 tab in there!" the man yells at a bouncer. His friend spits profanity at the same employee, who eventually responds by clocking him in the side of the head.
Feet away, four teens abandon a car they have parked haphazardly outside the club: Staff Sgt. Narine suspects the driver was drunk and surprised by the four officers who appeared on horseback in the laneway.
But his concern mounts as he recalls Jan. 9, when a similar scene ended with the driver fetching a handgun from his car, then threatening a bouncer. He later finds one of the teens trying to jump into a teenage girl's limo as she screams for police.
"On some nights, it's relatively quiet and the number of police can do the job with no problem. On other nights it is crazy and the police struggle to keep up," says Wayne Scott, chairman of the King-Spadina Residents Association. The group wants club owners to help pay for enforcement and clean up through a business licence fee.
"Our neighbourhood is trashed by people who have no vested interest in the community," says Mr. Scott, who is unsettled about the prospect of another club district taking hold west of Spadina. "We are trying to make sure that doesn't develop the same kind of character that the Entertainment District did."
Mr. Riapov, 23, says King Street West is gaining popularity because it is precisely everything the Entertainment District is not: "There's no trouble in the clubs, the category's older, there's no traffic."
He and his friends now opt instead for such posh lounges as Century Room and Cheval on King Street West, as well as Musik at Exhibition Place.
"That's where the big money gets spent," says Mr. Riapov, whose party will often spend close to $4,000 on a night out. He does not go out unless he receives bottle service, which he usually arranges with a club owner the day before.
On weekends, a 26-ounce bottle of vodka can cost up to $260, and depending on the number of bottles ordered, a waitress will sit with patrons and mix their drinks in a private booth.
The reality of an even larger, more dispersed club district divided by Spadina Avenue is not an option welcomed by police, who worry that it could be much more difficult to patrol.
"We could use our resources for something else than the Friday, Saturday night drain," Staff Sgt. Narine says.
A nearly naked bridal party stumbles by, going coatless to save money and time on coat check. Even on the coldest nights, young women can be seen shivering down the dark alleys, often in broken heels.
"Now you see why I don't want my kids coming down here," Staff Sgt. Narine says.
Copyright © 2007 CanWest Interactive, a division of CanWest MediaWorks Publications, Inc.. All rights reserved.
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