I would like to know how places in gen­er­al ob­tain a bar li­cense and ap­proval to have night­clubs in res­i­den­tial ar­eas.

Late­ly, we, the Wood­brook res­i­dents, have been deal­ing with nu­mer­ous clubs, road­side bars and oth­er prob­lems–the noise that vi­brates from the clubs, park­ing on the streets (if a club is grant­ed a li­cense, aren't they sup­posed to have a park­ing lot or space for the pa­trons?), the uri­nat­ing on the walls and T&TEC poles, the noise made by drunk peo­ple up­on re­turn­ing to their cars at 5.30 the fol­low­ing morn­ing, the mess left by those who de­part or are fre­quent vis­i­tors to these es­tab­lish­ments.

Now fight­ing bat­tles like these takes a very long time–let­ters to EMA, let­ter to City of Port-of-Spain, pe­ti­tions from neigh­bours, con­stant com­plain­ing, the fol­low­ing up and so on.Why, in the first place, are these places grant­ed these li­cences with­in a short dis­tance of res­i­dents–young and old–who gen­er­al­ly have chil­dren go­ing to school and who have to study or even need a good night's sleep?

I face an­oth­er se­ri­ous is­sue where I re­side and noth­ing is be­ing done. Yes, thank God I have air con­di­tion­ing, but those who do not are as­sault­ed by sounds that trav­el. I have mess­saged and phoned the own­ers, even called the land­lord. But with at­ti­tude, they more right than I am. How do we fight a bat­tle like this with lack of re­sources?Would it take an­oth­er five years of my time to deal with this night­club prob­lem? Wood­brook res­i­dents have it re­al hard.

MLH

Wood­brook