Brooklyn bar fights for its right (to stay open)
• Dec 28th, 2009 • Category: Beer News
Our first Brooklyn drinking experience took place at Freddy’s Backroom in Prospect Heights. The quirky neighborhood bar known for having a shark decorating the entryway and its diaorama club is a wonderful place to grab a beer, meet some folks, and hear tales about the old days.
It’s also an endangered locale. The Atlantic Yards project threatens to use eminent domain to close down the venue in the name of progress. In protest, patrons of Freddy’s built a nine-foot tall guillotine from Pabst Blue Ribbon cans and symbolically executed the plan.
“You cannot take property from one person and just give it to someone else,” manager Donald O’Finn told the New York Daily News, “So far we have worked within the law, but …the law has become so corrupt by money and greed that we cannot obey it. We are declaring revolt.”
Lesson learned: Don’t mess with a bar that owns a shark.
I wish Americans everywhere would stand up against this abuse of power. Imminent domain was never intended to assist developers or be used to help government increase their tax revenues! This has to be stopped or the slippery slope will get increasingly slippery and more property rights will be lost forever in the “land of the free”.
Kick arse Freddy’s!