Old Town Scottsdale’s nightlife is back
On May 11, Bevvy gastropub was one of the only businesses open along Scottsdale’s Saddlebag Trail, a usually buzzing street that’s home to some of metro Phoenix’s most popular bars and nightclubs. The road was empty; the windows of locked nightclubs and bars were boarded.
By Memorial Day weekend just two weeks later, the Scottsdale Entertainment District was alive with activity.
Videos of long lines outside packed clubs with dance floors full of customers flooded social media, as people ventured out in Scottsdale despite the ongoing coronavirus pandemic that still has much of the country on lockdown.
An outcry fueled by thousands of comments on social media spurred the city’s mayor to urge business owners to keep their patrons safe. But with Scottsdale police focusing on educating businesses about how to better operate rather than enforcing health and safety guidelines, the party in Scottsdale is likely to rage on.
Here’s why Arizona bars and nightclubs are open
As the state starts to reopen, the legality of bars reopening continues to be a gray area.
Gov. Doug Ducey announced restaurants could reopen their dining rooms as of Monday, May 11. He specified, however, bars were to remain closed, but also acknowledged the existence of businesses that blur the definition of what constitutes a restaurant or a bar, such as sports bars.
This loophole, which defines a restaurant as any business that serves food, allows bars to offer food menus of chips, peanuts and popcorn in order to reopen. As such, bars and breweries around Arizona have since reopened with varying levels of prepared foods for sale.
C.A.S.A., a bar on Mill Avenue in Tempe, sparked controversy after opening with a packed patio and long lines of students celebrating after Arizona State University’s graduation. In a news conference the following day, the governor referred to the bar as an “outlier,” saying most Arizona business owners would choose to do the right thing.
He praised Tempe police’s “light touch” in response to the overcrowded bar.
Throughout the week, more bars reopened including
Scottsdale.
Maya Day and Night Club, which is located in Scottsdale’s Entertainment District, hosted an event call “Dip & Dine” serving late-night snacks over Memorial Day weekend. Riot House, a nearby nightclub, now serves chips and salsa until 2 a.m., according to social media posts.
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Bar owners say they’re implementing ‘robust’ guidelines
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Despite the concerns about the photos and videos of overcrowded bars and clubs, Scottsdale bar owners say they’re protecting customers and following guidelines.
Scottsdale-based hospitality company Evening Entertainment Group owns 16 nightclub-come-restaurants throughout Arizona, including seven in the Saddlebag Trail area.
The company closed all of its Arizona locations two days prior to the day Ducey ordered bars to close, as the company “wanted to be part of the solution rather than the problem,” EEG owner and cofounder Les Corieri told The Arizona Republic in March.
On May 11, the company reopened Bevvy, a restaurant and bar, in the Scottsdale Entertainment District to test the company’s new safety protocols.
That day Bevvy manager Cameron Byram checked every customers’ temperature before they were permitted inside. Anyone with a reading over 100 degrees was not allowed to enter. He and his team also rearranged the space to make sure tables were at least six feet apart.
“We literally had tape measures in our hands measuring everything,” he told The Republic while wearing a ski mask covering his nose and mouth.
Byram felt pressure to enforce strict guidelines on staff and customers in hopes that more of the businesses along the block would be able to open soon, he said.
Throughout the following week, Bottled Blonde, Casa Amigos, Skylanes and Hi-Fi Kitchen & Cocktails also reopened for business with looser safety guidelines. Over Memorial Day weekend the businesses welcomed large crowds prompting Evening Entertainment Group to release a statement to The Arizona Republic in response to outcry over the crowds.
In the statement, the company says they “take the health and safety of our customers and employees seriously,” and “have implemented a robust set of operating guidelines in alignment with state and federal guidelines.”
The company says its safety plan has been “reviewed on-site by the Scottsdale Police Department to ensure they fit our specific concepts effectively, and will be reviewed and updated as necessary.”
The plan includes reducing capacity inside the bars by 40%, installing Plexiglas between booths, enforcing a maximum of 10 customers per booth, providing hand sanitizer stations, requiring all employees wear masks and encouraging social distancing both inside the business and in lines outside.
Riot Hospitality Group owns bars including Riot House, El Hefe and Dierks Bentley’s Whiskey Row in Scottsdale’s Entertainment District, along with other nightclubs and restaurants around the Valley and the country. That company released a simpler statement.
“Leading up to and during the reopening, our safety protocols for staff training and service, and our overall operations, go above and beyond what the state and county regulating agencies are recommending to our industry,” the statement read.
According to Scottsdale police, that’s all they need to do.
‘You are most likely not going to see any immediate action’
While partying continues throughout the Entertainment District, Scottsdale Police Department public information officer Sgt. Ben Hoster says the department will continue to offer the governor’s recommended “light touch” enforcement.
“You are most likely not going to see any immediate action,” Hoster said. “We are not going to be arresting anyone.”
Hoster said the police department received “zero calls for service in the downtown district of overcrowding” throughout Memorial Day weekend. Instead they were busy handling calls for issues such as fights, intoxication and assaults, Hoster said.
The responsibility of keeping employees and customers safe in regards to the health pandemic falls on individual business owners, Hoster said. But in order to operate legally, a business must have a plan.
The plan should be based on Ducey’s executive orders and public health recommendations. Each business owner may create their own plan to suit their business. The plans, however, do not need to be submitted or reviewed, Hoster said.
If Scottsdale police were to receive a call about overcrowding, the main goal in police response would be education, Hoster said.
Police would visit the business and educate the owner to better follow their plan. The business would be given the opportunity to fix any changes the police deemed necessary. Only after this process, if the business owner chose not to fix the behavior, would the police submit a report to Arizona Department of Liquor Licenses and Controls, which regulates businesses with liquor licenses. The report would then be submitted for review.
In response to the long lines and crowded Scottsdale streets, what people do outside in open space is up to them, Hoster said. Many videos showed long lines of customers, dancing and standing close together while waiting to get inside Scottsdale’s clubs.
Police could suggest people step farther apart, Hoster said.
“But we are definitely not going to take anyone to jail for clumping outside,” he added.
Scottsdale mayor says images from the bars are ‘disturbing’
Scottsdale Mayor Jim Lane posted an eight-part Twitter thread in response to the large crowds in the Entertainment District.
“The images from Old Town Scottsdale this weekend are disturbing, & frankly show a real lack of common sense & civic responsibility,” Lane wrote.
He placed responsibility on both businesses and their patrons to follow guidelines and provide a safe environment.
“It is imperative that all businesses comply with the governor’s executive orders – to ignore them is to risk faster spread of this disease and further damage to our physical and economic wellbeing,” Lane continued.
In response to the question of what is being done to prevent more weekend crowds at the bars, Lane echoed the police department and explained that the process would be to “educate businesses & solicit their cooperation first.”
Beyond that, Lane said he would contact business owners of crowded locations to talk about the importance of following the governor’s guidelines.
“Now more than ever we need people and businesses to do the right things,” Lane wrote.