NLV: Council rejects proposed tavern

Sonya Padgett

Thursday, June 17, 1999 | 11:17 a.m.

North Las Vegas has too many taverns and not enough family restaurants, residents told city officials Wednesday night as it considered an application for another pub.

"If there has to be another bar there, we prefer a salad bar," David C. Martinez, a resident, told the council.

After hearing neighbors' objections, the North Las Vegas City Council on Wednesday denied a local tavern owner's request to open a P.T.'s Pub and Grill at 1527 West Craig Road.

Thomas Boeckle, president of P.T. Gaming Corp. and owner of 20 P.T.'s Pubs, had asked the council to grant a special use permit to allow him to open a tavern and restaurant in the North Mesa Plaza, near Craig Road and Martin Luther King Boulevard.

There are so many bars in North Las Vegas, Adam Robbins, who lives at Lone Mountain Road and Clayton Street, told the council, a person could crawl instead of drive from bar to bar.

Not that that would stop people from driving, he said. Robbins opposed the tavern in North Mesa Plaza because he said it would invite more alcohol-related car accidents at the intersection of Martin Luther King Boulevard and Craig Road, which he called one of the busiest in the city.

North Las Vegas resident Nancy Shubert presented the council a list of 151 signatures of people opposing the bar she said she collected in two days.

"I've lived there six years," Shubert said. "If you walk around the neighborhood, what you see are families, mothers with strollers and children, not people who will frequent P.T.'s."

Another resident of the neighborhood, Tom Pennington, said that a tavern would not fit in with the other businesses in the plaza and would ultimately hurt the community.

"This is not an asset to the community. It brings nothing," he said. "Don't be fooled."

Councilwoman Stephanie Smith echoed residents' sentiments for more family-oriented restaurants.

Applebee's, which has a location near the Craig-Martin Luther King intersection, "is the top grossing Applebee's in the nation (and) proves our community is hungry for restaurants to take our families," Smith said.

Boeckle applied for and was denied a tavern permit for the same location in July 1998.

While the council held the line on the new tavern, it approved the settlement of a lawsuit filed by the Mendenhall Family Trust over the denial of an extension of time to build a hotel-casino in North Las Vegas.

The settlement gives the developer 18 months instead of two years to start the 800-room project at Craig and Losee roads. If progress isn't made by then, no further extensions will be requested.