Glen Mcgregor, The Ottawa Citizen
Published: Saturday, September 05, 2009The man at the bar with two drinks pointed his digital camera in the wrong direction and attempted to shoot a self-portrait. He looked down at the camera, frowned and snapped again.
With eyes half-closed, he made lethargic hand motions, struggled to stand and bumped others walking past. Several times he flashed a thumbs-up sign to friends.
When he tried to pour one drink into the other, red liquid spilled onto the ground. When he raised the glass for a sip, his mouth missed the straw.
Watching the customer was Mark Lambert, an undercover Ontario liquor inspector, who recorded these observations during a February 2007 visit to Tila Tequila, a popular nightclub in the ByWard Market.
Despite the customer's apparent drunkenness, a bartender poured him another vodka, Lambert would later allege in testimony against the club. Under Ontario's liquor laws, it is illegal to serve an intoxicated person or permit a drunken person on the premises.
During that covert visit, Lambert reported seeing seven other intoxicated patrons. Among them, he described a guy in a Canada hoodie who took a shot of tequila and kept falling into his group of friends; a well-dressed male who chugged from a bottle of Heineken and fell back into people behind him; and a red-haired female who lost her balance and elbowed Lambert in the stomach. On her way to the exit, she met a male and, with lethargic movements, groped and grabbed his buttocks, Lambert testified.
Inspection records suggest such scenes are not unusual in the ByWard Market.
More than one in every three bars or restaurants in the Market has been cited for a serious liquor licensing violation during the past five years, a Citizen investigation has found. Of the more than 80 licence holders in the Market, 22 have been served with licence suspensions requiring them to shut off the taps.
Liquor inspectors with the Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario (AGCO) have repeatedly written up ByWard Market clubs for serving alcohol to underage customers, allowing the use of illegal drugs and overserving, among other infractions.
Bars in the Market are cited for serious liquor violations at nearly three times the rate of licensed establishments elsewhere in the Ottawa area, a Citizen analysis of more than 16,000 liquor inspection records spanning the past five years shows.
In the weeks that followed Lambert's visit, liquor inspectors made more spot checks on Tila Tequila, recording more alleged instances of intoxication and overcrowding on the club patio.
(The reported infractions referred to in this and other stories in the series have not necessarily been proved before an AGCO review board or in court. The charges can be withdrawn or dismissed after they are reported by inspectors.)
The allegations against Tila Tequila would end up before a quasi-judicial review board hearing 14 months later.
During the five days of proceedings, bar owner Abbis Mahmoud said he had seen nothing out of the ordinary that night and couldn't remember the people Lambert described. Dozens of people wear red shirts or hoodies in his bar, he noted. If his staff had seen the man with red drinks acting the way Lambert described, they would be in serious trouble if they did not tell the club management, Mahmoud said.
Glen Mcgregor, The Ottawa Citizen
Published: Saturday, September 05, 2009The board found that five of the eight patrons noted by the inspector were drunk. The club also exceeded capacity and served intoxicated customers, the board found.
Tila Tequila was hit with a 17-day licence suspension. The penalty is currently stayed as the club appeals the decision to Ontario Divisional Court in a case expected to be heard early next year.
The number of violations found in Ottawa bars jumped in 2007, when inspectors began to focus on likely problem establishments and those in such popular areas as the Market or along Elgin Street.
The "risk-based enforcement" system has led to a sharp spike in licence suspensions in the approximately 1,000 licensed locations in Ottawa and the surrounding areas.
Last year, 44 area bars were docked for a total of 657 days -- an increase of 277 per cent over 2004.
Typically, suspensions are triggered by what the AGCO calls "the big five" infractions with the greatest potential to jeopardize public safety: serving minors, permitting drunkenness or disorderly conduct, having narcotics on the premises, overcrowding and serving after hours.
When less serious offences are included -- failing to post warning signs about fetal-alcohol syndrome, for example -- more than 83 per cent of ByWard Market bars and restaurants have been written up for some kind of infraction since 2004.
While the numbers suggest a degree of mayhem in the Market not seen elsewhere, bar owners say most clubs are run responsibly.
They point to the AGCO's ramped up inspections for increasing infractions.
Tila Tequila is one of the city's largest and busiest nightclubs and one with a young clientele.
Even at the hearing that led to the sanction against the club, one inspector lauded owner Mahmoud for his hands-on management and active interest in complying with the liquor laws. Mahmoud fought the AGCO on another set of allegations of liquor law infractions and this summer, an AGCO review board tossed them out.
Mahmoud complains that the AGCO unfairly singles out Market clubs.
"All risk-based licensing does is target bars that are busy," he says.
Since the allegations based on Lambert's report, Tila Tequila has increased the number of security staff to 14. Still, it is not always easy to spot a single problem in a crowd of customers.
To fight back, Mahmoud and other Ottawa bars owners last year formed the Ontario Restaurant and Bar Association (agcowatch.ca) to lobby over liquor policy and channel complaints about the AGCO and its inspectors.
The AGCO says it is just enforcing rules to protect public safety. It moved to a risk-based approach to better focus resources on areas most likely to have problems. The agency notes that the bars that get suspended make up a small minority of the 17,000 licensed establishments in the province. In Ottawa, only about four per cent of licensed establishments will be suspended in a given year.
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