A public meeting tonight at City Hall will be an opportunity for citizen comment regarding Kennedy Fried Chicken. The owners of the Main Street restaurant are requesting a renewal of their common victualler’s license (PDF), which relates to the sale of food. The meeting starts at 5:30 pm in Room 220, hosted by the city’s License Commission.
Update: The hearing has been postponed. According to an email from the License Commissioners:
Please be advised that the Kennedy Fried Chicken hearing scheduled for today has been postponed until January 25, 2007 at 5:30 p.m. in Room 220. The continuance was granted at the request of Kennedy’s counsel to provide them opportunity to review various documents relating to this hearing.
The Reminder‘s G. Michael Dobbs published a relatively detailed article about the city’s follow-up meetings after the heinous January 1 shootings at the restaurant. The piece says that two Springfield city councilors asked License Commission Chair Peter Sygnator not to renew the restaurant’s license.
According to the General Laws of Massachusetts, the License Commission "may refuse to sign a license for a person who, in his opinion, has not complied" with the license requirements. "If a licensee at any time conducts his licensed business in an improper manner," the law states, "the licensing authorities, after notice to the licensee and reasonable opportunity for a hearing, may upon satisfactory proof thereof suspend or revoke his license."
Dobbs’s article captures Sygnator’s comments about how little sway the commission has over the restaurant, primarily because it does not sell alcohol; all the License Commission could do is make "suggestions" about public safety measures, beyond its success at amending the hours (the place closes at 2:30 am instead of 4:00 am, although it is currently closed for business, lacking a license). The commission’s suggestion to use security cameras and off-duty police officers as guards apparently went nowhere. The article adds that Police Commissioner Edward Flynn has not been able to persuade any of the 50 restaurant patrons at the time of the shooting to come forward with information about guilty parties, quoting him as saying, "Everyone’s a tough guy. No one is going to tell who did it."
Sounds like this is a rather uncommon request for a common victualler’s license. The foolhardy owners of Kennedy Fried Chicken did not show up at the City Council public safety committee meeting Dobbs recounts—which would have been a decent opportunity to explain their plight in advance of a public meeting. Perhaps the owners savor drama, suspense, and disparagement. Update: Perhaps their legal counsel is offering useful help after all, by requesting a continuance to review paperwork and consider options.
I’m reminded of what Urban Land Institute panelist Patrick Fox said about the use of scarce city resources during a September presentation: "The city needs to regain the trust of the business and residential community, and establish consistent guidelines for decision-making."
Fox went on, "We heard from a lot of people, when we did the interviews, that there was too much concentration on the downtown. The downtown is the key part of the city, and the whole city cannot be healthy unless the downtown is healthy."
