Pols: Go on, boogie down
YOU CAN DANCE if you want to.
A law that has banned dancing at the vast majority of the city’s bars and nightspots for nearly a century was struck down Tuesday by a City Council vote.
The Council voted overwhelmingly to repeal the cabaret law, which prohibits dancing without a cabaret license. Fewer than 100 of the 26,000 bars and restaurants in the city have the license.
Nightlife lovers have gone after the law as archaic, originally motivated by racism, and a burden on business owners who are left scrambling to prevent the merest toe-tapping by their patrons or fearing a ticket.
City Councilman Rafael Espinal (D-Brooklyn) took up the cause on behalf of music aficionados and venues in his Bushwick district.
“The city’s cabaret law is outdated and unresponsive and has only gotten in the way of New Yorkers’ ability to fully express themselves — even pushing dancing to underground and unsafe and unregulated spaces,” Espinal said at City Hall on Tuesday.
“It’s time we right this historical wrong,” he said. “A repeal of the cabaret law will move toward decriminalizing dancing in New York City.”
The law dates to 1926, when it was put in place to go after Harlem jazz clubs where black and white patrons freely mixed.
Mayor de Blasio still has to sign off on the repeal, but he threw his support behind it last month.
The law would be cut loose, footloose, four months after the mayor signs the measure. The dancing ban has not been aggressively enforced in recent years, but businesses complain fines have been arbitrary and unfairly targeted certain types of music, including hip hop, electronic and Latin, over others. “We have horror stories from small-business owners of how the law has been used against them,” said Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito (D-Manhattan).
The bill will require nightspots to have security cameras, and to ensure that any bouncers or security guards they employ are licensed.
The legislation will not affect zoning laws that regulate where different types of businesses can operate.