Barkeeps are big part of downtown problems
Re: Dino Busato’s letter to the editor “Nail the core offenders not city bar businesses” (Tribune, Dec. 7).
The onus of destruction and debauchery downtown every weekend cannot be placed solely on poor enforcement issues and lack of bathroom accommodation.
It is very irresponsible to confront only the “customer” side of Guelph’s nightlife.
While I do agree people should be fined for doing bad things, enforcement is more complicated.
It is easier to find people urinating, fighting, throwing up and littering at 2 a.m. in downtown Guelph than it is to find Waldo in his wonderfully illustrated environments.
Are these people being fined? No. For whatever reason (lack of police resources, lack of police diligence, lack of people’s respect, etc), these people are not being fined. It is a fantasy to hold every person accountable for their actions when several thousand people shuffle into downtown every weekend.
That being said, I have spoken to downtown business owners who say the police are scared during the downtown scene. I’ve seen police just stand there while people fight.
I rarely see police walking around; mostly they just sit in their cruisers. That being said, they have an immensely difficult job and I respect what they do, although I think a more “pro-active” stance needs to be adopted by the police.
It is a bone-headed minority that is reeking chaos downtown. It is also a minority of bars responsible for producing the majority of boneheads. I’m a university student. I go to bars, and overserving is rampant.
Several clubs downtown have signs around the bar reading “Two-drink maximum after midnight.” I have never once seen the rule enforced by the servers, who fulfill orders for several drinks to overly drunk individuals – myself included.
People throw up when they drink too much, and if they bought a drink downtown then an irresponsible server contributed to the problem. It does not take an undercover sleuth to determine who is making people drunk downtown.
People pre-drink before they go downtown.
They are already drunk when they get there, and yet several servers will still provide drinks.
This places more trouble in the hands of security, who just throw drunks out into the public.
I feel the city made a terrible call when setting up the pissoirs and made a another terrible call with their subsequent removal. I feel the burden of rampant public urinating falls on the bar owners and the City of Guelph. It is cruel to expect people to drink beers and then lock them out of every washroom downtown when the bars close.
Bar owners and the city must provide a place to relieve oneself if they are profiting from pumping us full of liquid. Ensure adequate washroom facilities after the bars close, and then start fining people for urinating.
Ben Baena Guelph
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