Trouble in the Highlands

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Special guest Nick Morris, vice president of the Highlands Commerce Guild, joins us on the Access Louisville podcast this week. 

We chat about recent violence in the Highlands that has resulted from gatherings of teenagers and young adults in the area. Morris tells us what he's hearing from city leaders as well as businesses who want to see the issue addressed. 

Our partners at WDRB reported that last weekend's violence resulted in nearly 40 citations and 21 arrests. 

The city has put at least some of the blame on bars in the area.

This week Louisville Metro Alcoholic Beverage Control issued an emergency suspension order for Atomic, a Bardstown Road bar and gameyard following a shooting.

“We will not tolerate conditions at any establishment that threaten the safety of our community,” Louisville Mayor Craig Greenberg said. 

But, as WDRB reported, Atomic and other bars in the area have pushed back on that characterization, noting that violence isn't being caused by their customers but rather people showing up and walking or cruising the streets.

Bardstown Road bars "are being blamed for things occurring off our properties and in the public right of way where we have no control, rather than the bad actors themselves being held accountable for their actions," said Dustin Hensley, co-owner of Atomic Louisville.

Access Louisville is a weekly podcast from Louisville Business First. You can find it on popular podcast services including Apple and Spotify.

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:00

Violence in the Highlands neighborhood is again in the news. We're going to talk about it next on Access Louisville. Thanks for joining us. My name is David Mann, and joining me today is Shea Van Hoy. Hey everybody. We also have a special guest, Nick Morris, Vice President of the Highlands Commerce Guild. Welcome, Nick. Good afternoon. Access Louisville is a weekly podcast from Louisville Business First. Each week we bring you the latest news and plenty of sharp opinions on what's going on here in Louisville, Kentucky. A few things before we get into it. First, this podcast is sponsored by Baird. Discover the difference Baird can make in your financial life at rwbaird.com/slash Louisville. We'll hear more from Baird later in the show. Also, our next live podcast is set for July 30th. I'm calling this one How Louisville Lives. We're going to talk about the ins and outs of residential real estate with three local experts who will be on the show. The housing market is a constant conversation around town. So I hope you can make it out for this event. You'll get some real insights into where the market is going next. I'll leave a link in the description of this show where you can find tickets to that event. But for now, let's get into the Highlands. I'll give you the gist of it basically. And you guys correct me if I get anything wrong here. The gist of it is that uh crowds of young people have been kind of flooding into the streets around Bargetown Road, particularly uh, you know, uh late night, uh, and that's resulted in violence and arrest. And we've seen this in years past. Business First doesn't often cover crime, but there are some cases where crime and business kind of intersect, and this is one of those. On the one hand, we've got a the city blaming a couple of businesses. Uh, it's suspended the liquor license of Atomic, one of the bars in the area. Uh, the bars have pushed back and said, these aren't their customers that are doing it, these are other people. Uh, and at the same time, uh, Mr. Morris, you're here with the Commerce Guild and you're worried about the impact it's having on businesses, you know, overall around the Highlands. Just uh so we'll start there. I guess what do you think the the impact is? And you know, having these having this news out there, having these videos out there, you know, it you feel like it definitely hurts the Highlands neighborhood, right?

SPEAKER_02 2:22

Well, yes, it does. And let me tell you a little bit about what the Highland Commerce Skill does. We are the business association for the for the business corridor. Sure. So um, and we aim to promote, support, and advocate for small business. So um when something like this happens, obviously it's a very negative influence on business. Uh there's uh many, many legitimate businesses that uh can be affected by this as well. Yeah, whether it's um a perceived security from people who may be visiting in the highlands to shop or to dine and and uh partake, so to speak. Um if that message continues to get out to the public, we're we're gonna lose customers, yeah. Lose foot traffic. And we're already low on foot traffic in the highlands.

SPEAKER_03 3:09

Yeah, yeah, I've heard that, you know, from a couple different uh businesses like uh Mark Speedstore, you know, kind of had decided that, you know.

SPEAKER_02 3:16

So we if we have teamed up with um we work closely with LMPD, the uh Metro government, the neighborhood associations, and businesses themselves to uh work as a team on this. Uh we feel it has to be a joint effort. Um nobody has the perfect answer. The uh LMPD is doing a great job. They've tried many things and still have have had some success, but but um as time goes on, another weekend uh uh arise, we'll see what kind of results we we get. So um, but this as you mentioned I touched on earlier, this has been in other neighborhoods. It's Nulu had an issue for a while, even downtown, uh Frankfurt Avenue, maybe a little bit. So these folks who are out, both uh minors and and some adults, that's quite a mix. Large numbers too. And um we don't know exactly what what they're how they go about choosing a location where they're gonna gather. And we're not sure if they're using some maybe some form of um social media to send out a blast, so to speak, yeah. Come to the highlands at Prince Dead Drive uh at 1 a.m. or whatever. So the police try to monitor that as best they can. And also um LMPD has touch base with other cities. There's probably three or four other cities, Nashville being closest that they have touch base with to see how they're they're it seems like there's eight or ten cities that have had a similar problem. Yeah. So um it's not new, but it is very frustrating because it's just so hard to deal with.

SPEAKER_03 4:50

Yeah, I bet. Shay, what are people saying about it in the neighborhood? You're a longtime Highlands resident. Is this something that that's a conversation with your neighbors, or is it, you know, you know, it's weird.

SPEAKER_01 5:00

Like I I moved to my house on Bonnie Castle 13, almost 14 years ago. And I know we'll get into this a little bit more, but one of the reasons I chose to live there was because I can walk to things that are fun to do. Restaurants, I went to the bars more, especially later at night when then 13 years ago than I do now, probably, which is not very often, you know, past like nine or 10 would be late for me. But um, you know, it's not really it hasn't really been a talk about neighbors because um I don't know that my neighbor well, I don't think that my neighbors are the ones out and about that late. You know, um my uh although I do get, you know, uh some cut-through uh car traffic on my street because it's a one-way leading toward Bardstown Road, you know, it's even though we're I'm a block and a half removed from Bardstown Road, it's quiet. So, which is another thing that people like about the Highlands. Like you have the vibrant strip um uh you know, that Nick has talked about is is suffering a little bit right now in various ways. Uh, but then you know, you go two blocks off of it and you feel like you're you know in a in a in a quiet suburb type of place. So um I do think it it is a hot topic though among obviously business owners, because like like he said, if you um, you know, I think about late night places like uh just late night places that are serving food, McDonald's, La Bamba, um, you know, they're probably in the crossfire some of this too, because people are out in front of their businesses. If I was walking down Bartstone Road and there are a bunch of people out in front of La Bamba, would I want to go in or would I maybe, you know, not? So um, you know, it's definitely the the buzz, I think, more among the businesses and then obviously social media. Uh it's everywhere.

SPEAKER_03 6:31

Feel sorry for the DoorDashers who are trying to get the get the late night food to people.

SPEAKER_01 6:35

Yeah, I I will admit to that late night sometimes. So yeah.

SPEAKER_03 6:38

Well, what's the Highland uh Commerce Guild's message in all this? Are you guys um kind of talking to your members and what are you what are you trying to tell them?

SPEAKER_02 6:46

We're continually getting feedback. We just try to be the sounding board and also coordinate uh folks that that want to speak and uh and help get that message out and um and just continue to kind of feel for what is what are some solutions here. Yeah. Because again, I would I I would love uh for me to have the the magic bullet. Yeah. I don't know if I should say that or not.

SPEAKER_01 7:07

And and not to and not to have to talk about it anymore. I talk about other things. I think uh but you you bring up a good point because one of the great things about the Highlands, Louisville in general, but you guys are you know uh looking up you know primarily for the business interest, but then you've got a bunch of really vibrant neighborhood associations as well. I'm in the Deer Park neighborhood, our you know, neighborhood associations really like we get m we get quarterly newsletters and uh they have events and all this. So you have some. I think the good thing in in the highlands um is you have people who really invested, both the the residents and the business owners and wanting it to be as good as it can be.

SPEAKER_02 7:40

There's nine historic neighborhoods that align the business corridor on both sides. You know, you got the Triangle, Turkey Triangle, Deer Park, um Um Tyler Park, Newcastle, Douglas. I mean, great neighborhoods. I mean, and these folks are they're they're vocal, they can be vocal, and they should be vocal. Yeah, because uh they can be directly affected. Because I mean, if you're on Barstown Road, the houses start what 100 feet uh from the Barstown Road or they're about 100, 200 feet, whatever, but they're close.

SPEAKER_01 8:12

Yeah, and it's like a kind of a double, like you want the traffic of all, especially foot traffic, but like you know, I remember uh you know, times when you know Barstown Road, it was like cruising Barstown Road was a thing, you know, and that's that's cool, but like you said, also I've seen I've seen at the intersection of Barstown and Eastern like people like not just running red lights, but sort of taking over the intersection and like the dirt bikes, just bizarro stuff.

SPEAKER_03 8:34

So yeah. Uh let's see here. What do you guys think of the city's response to this? I know you uh kind of were saying that a lot of the bars are pushing back to what the city is saying.

SPEAKER_01 8:45

I mean, um Nick would know a little bit better about formally what they're doing. Obviously, like I've seen there's you know, there's the the um the lights that are out in front of Atomic and the hub now, like to to brighten up the area. Um, it does seem like, you know, you kind of think of it both ways, like, well, if there was a preventative police presence, which I'm you know figuring there already is, wouldn't that deter some things? Like I said, you can move spots and that can change things up. Um, but also then you get another another situation where if you're coming in from out of town and you're staying in an Airbnb or whatever, and you see just like a heavy police presence, that can also freak you out in the other way. Like, wait, what's going on here? Why is this place like this? So uh yeah, I don't know, don't know what, you know, don't know what the the answer is, but I know there's I know the citation where citations have been written, arrests have been made. It doesn't seem so far to be deterring it, but maybe eventually it moves to another part of town, which obviously isn't good either.

SPEAKER_02 9:38

Yeah. Yeah, it's it's unfortunate. You would think that those under 18, the minors, uh, and there seems to be a fair number of those. I don't I haven't heard, and it's difficult for the police, you know, if they see people gathering as a large crowd or maybe even breaking out into a fight, they don't know if that person is 17 uh 21, so to speak. So they have to quote kind of proceed with caution. But I mean, you would think that and this is me because of my age, I guess, but you think that families and our parents would play a stronger part in kind of quote policing our kids. Right.

SPEAKER_03 10:11

Yeah. How do you feel about kind of businesses getting blamed here uh when really it's people on the street?

SPEAKER_01 10:18

Yeah. I mean, I think there have been some instances of not just Sparts Town Road, but in Louisville where obviously businesses aren't operating in good faith, whether that means overserving someone or um, you know, not just taking care of their immediate area in terms of like I if you see something, you know, or overselling an event, maybe. Yeah, exactly. Overselling event. Um so that that does happen. Um I have you know, I have no insight in what went on in the atomic situation, but I do also think that you know, once your customer leaves your property, unless you've overserved them, if it's just a normal business transaction, how are they your responsibility to me? Um, you know, if someone comes in and we do an interview in the office here and they leave our, you know, and like they're not our responsibility anymore. So um, and I know that's an ex not an apples to apples uh comparison, but yeah, it does seem too that um, you know, I know it's probably just trying to one idea to fix this, but um I you know is it always the businesses? I know the owner of Baxter 942 talked about this. He's like, once people leave, I can't take I can't control what they do. And in some of these instances, there's so many people that it can't be just tied to a business.

SPEAKER_03 11:30

Also, it's 1 a.m. Tell me someone who's out there causing this violence is having their first drink at 1 a.m. I think they're probably they've had a few things before.

SPEAKER_01 11:39

And then maybe they show up at Atomic, get one drink, and then leave, but they've already had, you know, and then in this instance, you know, you know after the after the weekend, you know, Hub came out first and said this was not anything to do with us. Then the um suspension came down on atomic, you know, atomic's like this wasn't our customer. And then some of the other businesses, which I get, uh, Highlands Tap room were sticking up for Atomic. So um, you know, it if you're feeling like you're you're doing everything you can, you have security, accurate security, you have cameras, um, and you're not overserving people. I don't know, I don't know what else you can do, really. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 12:12

Yeah, it's so hard to track. I mean, um, and to pinpoint any kind of that's the source, so to speak, of the issue. Uh, because they're one thing, just so many people. I mean, they I think some of them are just coming to be in the crowd and not going in the bar. Tribe mentality, whatever you want to call it.

SPEAKER_03 12:32

Yeah. I was gonna ask, what what do you guys think the solution to all this is? And is is the 2 a.m. is that the solution?

SPEAKER_01 12:40

I mean, I think it's a I think it's a help. And uh, granted, if you asked me this when I was 24, I probably would have told you. No way. I would have like, if you would like, or like, you know, you should have the option to stay out. But I but when um uh other than like if you're coming from Chicago, which I think is 5 a.m., but a lot of people but they move here and you're like, oh yeah, some of the bars can stay up until 4 a.m., they're like astonished.

SPEAKER_03 13:00

They're shocked, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:00

Yeah, because most states or a lot of times it's statewide, right? Like Indiana, I think it's it's um 3 a.m. or 2 a.m. But it's a statewide law. Kentucky lets it piecemeal, whether you can sell alcohol at all, like still dry counties, as we've written about before. Um, so now then you have 2 a.m. and 4 a.m. and um I mean it's 4 a.m. is pretty late. Like uh, you know, I don't know. Like I said, I'm I'm older now, but um do we maybe maybe just make it standardized and a little earlier, and I think you'd cut off some of the issues and Derby can remain its own thing with its own.

SPEAKER_03 13:33

Yeah, maybe the exceptions derby because that's yeah, because you have so many people from out of town.

SPEAKER_01 13:37

Yeah, and yeah.

SPEAKER_02 13:39

It would be interesting, I think, to know what what the numbers are now. In other words, how many businesses, let's say just the bars, let's say there's 50 bars. How many, what are their closing hours? In other words, let's say ten of them were or midnight, um, another 10 or 2 a.m. and maybe five or you know, four a.m. So and I'm not sure that would not any solution to the problem by any means, but at least it would give us a little bit of a handle on how many businesses are actually staying open till 4 a.m.

SPEAKER_01 14:13

Yeah. Even if they have the license, are they really staying open that late? Yeah. Or is it just based on traffic and close whenever? Yeah. Yeah. So uh yeah, I know you know, on the other hand, is like back in the day, you know, the back door was open late, and like I never saw any problems like ever at the black back door or outside. So anyway.

SPEAKER_03 14:32

This is kind of one of those, I guess, uh fringy questions, but that a lot of people are saying, and you know, who knows if this is true, uh, the city's putting all its resources into New Lou, and that's why the Highlands is getting this. So is it A, do you I guess the question is, does the city have the resources to maintain, you know, two lively areas or or multiple lively areas with lots of bars? Or um you know, is is it kind of being stretched then because you know New Lou has got its own bar scene, and now you know, you know, you got cops over there that have to patrol New Lou and where they used to just have to patrol barge down road, you know, maybe 20 years ago. Is that a thing or is that just uh I don't know, all cities need that.

SPEAKER_02 15:15

That's that's hard to say because you almost need to look at look at all the numbers and have some figures before you. But uh it seems to me, I I think I think the mayor and L MPD and and I know our our uh Benveno Weber, our you know, council person, um they are on the front lines and and are doing anything and everything they can. There is the the special sum summer task force that's been established. I think there's been 24, 27 officers assigned to the highlands on, I think, 10-hour shifts.

SPEAKER_03 15:47

It's one of those things probably people have opinions on, but not necessarily but they're not necessarily informed opinions.

SPEAKER_01 15:52

I will I will say that um I do feel the presence of, and I've talked about this on here before, um, the ambassador program um is is like when I drive to work in the morning, you know, they're out cleaning up. Um, but I think that's more of a daytime thing, right? Um you and they're downtown as well. And you know, I've seen them in other, they were they were really had a big presence in Minneapolis when I was there, just right after COVID, a little bit, where any block you went downtown, there was someone cleaning up, they'd ask you how you were doing. They would say, Do you need directions anywhere? I was like, man, I must look like a tourist. What am I doing? Um, but even here, you know, walking around at downtown at lunch, though folks will say hi or hey, how's your day going? Do you need any help? Um, not knowing if you're a tourist. They do have a good presence in the highlands along Barstown Road, at least during the day. Um, but you can't expect that to be like a 24-7 type of position. So I think the you know, downtown Louisville partnership and the city have tried to mitigate with that a little bit. But yeah, especially if these if these incidents are are jumping around to different parts of the city, it is hard to cover that. If you're like, well, is it gonna be New Loo tonight? Is it gonna be Butchertown? Um and it and we haven't talked about this, but something that I know Michael Jones, uh friend of the show, uh or on the show, said before, is you know, uh some Airbnb owners are now citing the fact that Airbnb apparently doesn't tell you where the people are from who are renting. So um, you know, the house parties are becoming a problem, and that could be spill out into a street and not have anything to do with the bars.

SPEAKER_03 17:23

So that too. Yep. All right. Well, interesting stuff. Uh, we'll go ahead and wrap it up there. Uh, Nick, thanks so much for coming on. Glad to be here. Um, we're gonna get a word from our sponsors over at Baird, and then me and Shay will be back after that. Stay tuned.

SPEAKER_00 17:37

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SPEAKER_03 18:08

Jay, I'll start with you. Why don't you uh give us something to think about out?

SPEAKER_01 18:12

Yeah, we're just a day after uh when we're recording this, a day after our Power 50 uh reception, which is an annual private reception we do for our Power 50, which is uh our annual grouping of the most influential business and civic leaders in Louisville. Um we also did uh our second, I think it's our second iteration of the Hall of Fame. Uh so those four uh most of those inductees were there and said a few words. Uh and then our five on the rise for people who are kind of up and coming. Um and then and uh you'll if you want to go uh check out some our social media, we have some gonna have some videos. I did some interviews with a few of the honorees, and um something I've kind of learned is living here, and Steve Traeger uh from Republic Bank talked about is um, you know, in the spirit of all those uh business leaders being in the same room and sharing stories and probably sharing business deal ideas and things, just how um Louisville is really accessible to folks to get meetings, to um get people to respond to you for the most part. If they don't, it's an outlier to have conversations, to get coffee, to get happy hour, and talk about um how we can improve the city. Um Steve talked about that on his video, and it's just something that um you know, we have business journals across the region. Um, you talk to other people, and in some cities, um, be it just a bigger city uh or um just a different city, that's not always the case. So it's one of the good things, uh really good things about Louisville.

SPEAKER_03 19:37

Yeah. Uh yeah, definitely a good point. I've heard that from a lot of people. So uh I will uh I'll use my uh time here to just give a shout out to uh USA Soccer. Um they um, you know, some people had their doubts about them. Uh they came in, beat Paraguay uh uh, you know, with a 4-1 match, and then beat Australia with a 2-0 match. And uh they've already qualified for the next round. That uh that's gonna start in July July. July 1st is gonna be the round of 32. Uh so it's uh it's been really cool. And uh all on America's 250th birthday. So, you know, it's uh it's all coming together just like we planned it. All right, but uh yeah, moving on.

SPEAKER_01 20:21

Uh if they got to the round of 16, that'd be pretty crazy.

SPEAKER_03 20:25

It gets exciting when uh when we do well at soccer.

SPEAKER_01 20:28

Yeah, I've well I um I am not a huge soccer fan, and I'm not one of those people that like if I say that that doesn't mean I dislike it or I'll be like grumpy. Um but I've enjoyed like all like getting ready in the morning or when I get home from work, like turning on and watching a few minutes of random country plays random country. Yeah, same here. And it's awesome, of course, to see like small countries do well and yeah, along with obviously the US playing well.

SPEAKER_03 20:52

I think it's just the World Cup is great because this is like the world's game. Like if another planet came around and said, Hey, what is Earth's game? It's it's soccer, you know, and uh and it's it's every country has their own favorite sport, and you know, obvious obviously football and baseball are are are usuals, but uh soccer is definitely the world's sport.

SPEAKER_01 21:14

So one of the things is um, you know, politically people were like are people not gonna show up come to the US because of for obvious reasons, right? Um but like it's been awesome to see like all these fans who are just here for like in the in Houston, you know, the Netherlands team like marched three miles from like Rice University campus to the stadium. And then I was watching uh I saw something of the Mets game, and so all the and then all these fans they have several days to do other stuff. So I'm sure that not only are they going to like Waffle House and things like that, um, and Bucky's, I know, but they're also like going to other sporting events. So like there were like it had to be at least a thousand. I don't remember what team fans at the Mets game the other day. All in the bleach and the bleachers, and you know, so that's awesome too, is like uh just you know, because it's like a once-in-a-lifetime trip. Like that's a lot of money. Yeah. Um, staying here that long, getting a hotel, all this, and they're just going all out and having all the American fun.

SPEAKER_03 22:15

Yeah, and they have good chance and and and fun traditions that are that are fun for us to watch too. Yeah. So all right. Well, that is it. If you like what you hear, please consider following the Access Louable Podcast on popular podcast services, including Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Thank you very much, Shay. Thank you, Nick Morris, for joining us this week. Of course, thank you, Baird, for the support, and uh thank you guys for listening to us out there, and we will see you next time. Bye.