Trapped by History

Seidenfaden’s Cafe has been a bar since 1921. For decades, some member of the namesake family operated the small, neighborhood drinking establishment on the corner of Vine and Breckinridge streets. Then in 2002, Dan Heck bought the building at 1134 Breckinridge and his son Jimmy took over the bar. Under the younger Heck, Seidenfaden’s became a popular indie rock nightspot known for cheap drinks, live music, and karaoke twice a week. But the music ended in June when Jimmy Heck was cited by the Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control (ABC) for “expansion of premises,” due to a patio he had opened in back of the restaurant. It turned out that having music and outside seating were prohibited because, according to the city, Seidenfaden’s isn’t really zoned for commercial use. 

 

Like many neighborhood bars that existed before the local zoning laws were standardized in 1971, Seidenfaden’s is zoned R6, or multi-family use. Because a bar was operated out of the building for decades, it is grandfathered in – what the Board of Zoning refers to as having nonconforming rights. However, those rights do not extend to new uses of the facility that violate residential zoning codes. In the case of Seidenfaden’s, this means no patio and no live music. The results have been devastating for business.  

 

“They kind of took the wind out of our sails,” says Jimmy Heck. “We are down 35 percent from where we were this time last year. It’s not good. We’re just barely floating by right now. We have a lot of fixed costs coming up with licensing and insurance. I really don’t know where that money is going to come from.”

 

Stephen Lutz, the Planning Supervisor for Louisville Metro Planning and Design Services, says Seidenfaden’s experience is not uncommon. After the Louisville Metro Council implemented a citywide smoking ban in 2007, bar owners opened outside facilities to accommodate smokers. Now, many bars within the old City of Louisville limits are being hit with “expansion of premises” citations because they lack the proper zoning. This is especially true in Germantown, an old neighborhood with a strong drinking tradition. The Nachbar, 969 Charles Street, and the Swan Dive, 921 Swan Street, were also cited by ABC earlier this year.

 

“That’s where we’re running into a lot of telephone calls,” Lutz says. “Not just from Germantown – we get them from Portland, Old Louisville, South Louisville, all over, from the same sort of circumstance. They are zoned residentially and the customers want to go outside and smoke and take their beer with them. That’s illegal. You can go outside and smoke, but you just can’t take your drink.”

 

After Seidenfaden’s was cited for the patio and live music, Heck met with Lutz to discuss his options. He was told that he could apply to the Board of Zoning Adjustment to be rezoned C1, like restaurants that serves liquor; or C2, which is a full tavern with greater freedom. Rezoning is an expensive process that involves a vote from the Louisville Metro Council. The other option for Heck was to prove that live music and outdoor drinking existed at Seidenfaden’s prior to 1971. 

 

“There is a legal nonconforming use for a bar there,” Lutz explains. “That’s not an issue. There is a bar there and it’s legal to be there. It’s not uncommon for a bar to have a band come in or a guy with an acoustic guitar, but you have to prove that all the way back to 1971, which is very difficult to do simply because no one keeps those records back to 1971.”

 

The Nachbar is in a similar situation. That hipster establishment was cited by ABC in July because people were outside drinking on the bar’s front patio. The Board of Zoning Adjustment, ABC and the Office of Inspections, Permits and Licenses are under the umbrella of the city’s Department of Codes and Regulations. James Gunnoe, the Nachbar’s owner, hired a lawyer who got an injunction against the closing of the patio because ABC was citing the bar for what was actually a zoning matter which should have been handled by a different agency. An injunction was granted and the Nachbar has a zoning assessment hearing scheduled for October 18. Gunnoe says he has affidavits from longtime Germantown residents who remember outdoor drinking at the location well before 1971.

 

“As far as we know, people have been drinking outside here since 1938,” he says. “It came as a huge shock the night we were cited. We had a spelling bee that night and an officer said we had to get all the people inside. We didn’t think this was possible.”

 

Heck believes the smoking ban is responsible for all the problems Germantown bars are experiencing. At first, Heck ignored the ban and simply paid the fines when he was cited for letting customers smoke. But in early 2009, he got a letter from ABC warning that his liquor license would be revoked if he was cited again. That’s when he decided to turn the 10-foot by 30-foot space behind his bar into a patio. But instead of improving his situation, the patio made it worse. 

 

“As soon as that patio was created, my neighbor behind me got upset about the level of noise coming in near his bedroom,” Heck explains. “I wanted to work with him. We set some times up – midnight during the regular week and whenever on the weekends. That worked for about a year, and then just this past March we got some new neighbors on Breckinridge. They moved in and they began complaining about all the noise that was coming out of here from the bands we had playing.”

 

When Seidenfaden’s neighbors didn’t get satisfaction from the police department, they started calling ABC and the zoning department. Lutz says people should not assume that the city is targeting these small, neighborhood bars for no reason. “Most of it is complaint driven,” he says. “Somebody picks up the phone and says that you’re doing something illegal. We have a responsibility to go out there and look; not the people in our office, but the enforcement people. If someone has lived there 10 minutes or 10 years, we have to go out there and look and determine if there has been a violation.”

 

Gary Allen, president of the Schnitzelburg Area Community Council, believes that if bars are not allowed to have outside facilities, they should be exempt from the smoking ban. “I think what the city is doing is downright stupid,” Allen says. “People have been drinking here since 1860. We are about to have our 100th Schnitzelburg Walk and we’ve never had a problem with the police. I don’t understand why somebody can walk down the street with a beer in their hands but they can’t sit on a patio and drink one.”