Bottle service now on Quinn's radar after brawl in SoHo club; issue likely to be raised at SLA hearing June 20

Concern over the belated announcement of Jay-Z's 40/40 Club in the Barclays Center, apparently bringing previously undisclosed bottle service, surely must have been heightened by a high-profile melee at a bottle service club in SoHo this week.

The impact of the brawl and the bottle service announcement is unclear, but surely the issue will be raised before the State Liquor Authority at a hearing June 20 on the arena liquor license.

The brawl

DNA Info reported yesterday, in Bottle Service May Be on the Rocks After Chris Brown/Drake Brawl :

City Council Speaker Christine Quinn Friday called for an emergency meeting with NYPD brass and the nightlife industry in the aftermath of a brawl in a SoHo club between Chris Brown and Drake over Rihanna.
Quinn, a mayoral hopeful whose district includes scores of nightclubs in Chelsea and the Meatpacking District, said she wanted to prevent the type of violence that broke out at WIP early Thursday, which left five people injured.
"The purpose of this meeting is to send a clear message to all nightclub patrons that bottles cannot be used as weapons and to determine if the guidelines surrounding bottle service need to be updated or reworked," Quinn said in a statement.

Apparently the New York Police Department and the Nightlife Association were will meet next week.

Quinn action?

The New York Post, in a typically understated article headlined ‘Nanny’ Quinn eyes ban on bottle service in ‘fightclubs’, reported:

City Council Speaker Christine Quinn took a page out of Mayor Bloomberg’s buzzkill playbook yesterday, announcing a plan to crack down on nightclub bottle service to prevent them from being used as weapons.
...Quinn has no specific plan to baby-proof nightlife in New York — such as replacing $2,000 bottles of Champagne with sippy cups.
...Remi Laba of Bagatalle in the Meatpacking District added: “To say bottle service is the reason for fighting makes no sense for several reasons. Are we saying that dive bars, pubs and places that don’t have bottle service don’t have fights?”

No one should go overboard with expectations of action from Quinn. As the New York Times reported yesterday in a completely unsurprising front-page article headlined Mayoral Hopes Seen as Muting Quinn's Voice, she's found it easy to talk about noncontroversial (in New York) issues like gay marriage but clams up when it comes to the real donnybrook issue, land use:

But she has remained silent on the biggest development issue unfolding in her own backyard, one favored by her big-money donors and real estate interests and hotly opposed by the neighborhood activists who helped propel her to prominence.

And, of course, Quinn hasn't even permitted the City Council to hold an oversight hearing regarding Atlantic Yards.

Jay-Z's history

In its report today, the New York Times mentioned one episode that apparently didn't scotch Jay-Z's venture into nightlife:

New York clubs have been the sites of celebrity brawls before. In December 1999, Jay-Z was accused of stabbing the record producer Lance Rivera in the stomach at the now-shuttered Kit Kat Klub in Times Square. He pleaded guilty and served three years probation.