Baltimore liquor board renews Sangria Patio Bar’s license
Mount Vernon lounge Sangria will keep its liquor license after Baltimore’s Board of Liquor License Commissioners threatened to strip the business of its right to sell alcohol based on community complaints.
Commissioners voted Thursday to renew Sangria’s license for another year after attorneys for the lounge and the Mount Vernon-Belvedere Association, a community group, said they had made some progress in board-ordered mediation talks.
“We’ve had several productive conversations with the Mount Vernon-Belvedere Association,” Caroline Hecker, a lawyer for Sangria, told commissioners. “At its heart, this really breaks down to a lack of communication between the MVBA and the members of Sangria.”
Hecker said the business at 930 N. Charles St. would agree to several new commitments intended to address community concerns and smooth over tensions with neighbors. Partners in the lounge will attend at least three Mount Vernon-Belvedere Association meetings per year and will communicate with the neighborhood group’s leadership at least monthly through the end of 2023.
In response to complaints about trash, noise and security, Sangria will lock its dumpster, work with city inspectors on noise mitigation efforts and schedule regular security patrols of the front and back of its building.
The lounge will also require patrons to enter and exit through its Charles Street doors, after neighbors shared concerns about two recent shootings that occurred in a parking lot located behind Sangria, though it does not belong to the business.
Despite the concessions, Stephan Fogleman, an attorney representing the Mount Vernon-Belvedere Association, said the group was still opposed to Sangria’s license being renewed. The MVBA’s biggest sticking point, he said, is the lounge’s closing time.
Under a memorandum of understanding (MOU) signed in 2016, Sangria is supposed to close by 1 a.m., except on nights when there are major sporting events on television. Neighbors say the business has taken an expansive interpretation of what constitutes a major sporting event, often staying open until 2 a.m.
In mediation, the community group asked Sangria’s owners to come up with a list of events that would qualify for the extra latenight hour. Hecker said they tried, but were unable to pin down a definitive list.
“The problem is there are some events that we just don’t know about,” including boxing tournaments, which are not always announced with much advance notice, she said. Hecker added that the Sangria team objects to having restrictions on its hours that are not imposed on other neighboring businesses. Community members point out that the lounge agreed to those terms during the MOU negotiation process.
Commissioners encouraged Sangria to find a solution to the dispute over opening hours. But board chair Albert Matricciani said he had seen enough progress to support renewing the liquor license.
“It sounds like you’ve done a lot of good work,” Matricciani said.
Still, representatives of both the lounge and the community acknowledged there is more to be done to mend the relationship.
“It’s going to be ongoing and we’ll have to constantly keep on partnering and communicating,” said Julieanna McGuire, a partner at Sangria.
“I think that we’re still far apart,” said Jack Danna, the MVBA’s president. “There were discussions; you can’t say they were positive. What was important to the community was left out.”
Sangria’s owners have said they feel singled out as some of the few Black business owners in the neighborhood. The liquor board’s chief inspector, John Chrissomallis, said in a previous hearing that Sangria ranks among the top five establishments that are most reported to his office via 311 calls.
Joshua Harris, vice president of the Baltimore chapter of the NAACP, attended Thursday’s hearing to support the lounge.
“This isn’t the first time this has happened to a minority-owned business,” Harris said after the meeting. “We’ve been involved with this because we want to make sure there aren’t inequities with one of the few minority-owned businesses in the neighborhood. We know implicit bias is a real thing and people need to be aware.”
Danna and community members counter that they have backed their complaints up with evidence, in the form of video footage and police reports.
“We have approached this in a very fairminded way,” Danna said. “When there are two shootings, you’re found in violation of the MOU, those are all substantiated.”
Ricardo Jones, another partner at Sangria, said he thinks the community and businesses should work together to standardize the MOU requirements for businesses in the Mount Vernon neighborhood.
“I think a lot of issues would be eliminated if there was a standard across the board,” Jones said.