UPDATE FEBRUARY 12, 2011 On Thursday, February 10th, Baja Sharkeez received a letter from Huntington Beach Police Chief Ken Small advising the restaurant of changes to their Entertainment Permit.

Effective March 1st, citing a large number of violations and public safety concerns, the new Entertainment Permit will restrict entertainment at Sharkeez to 11:00PM daily, from its current time of 1:30AM.

The story was broken by the Huntington Beach Independent (click HERE).

The HBDRA Board of Directors issued an official statement:

“The board of the HBDRA stands with the Chief of Police in his bold efforts to reform the atmosphere and make Downtown Huntington Beach a safe and inviting place for guests and residents alike.

If the Chief or any City official would like to discuss further ways to implement solutions at Sharkeez or any other downtown locations, we would be willing and eager to meet representing the needs and concerns of the residents of Downtown Huntington Beach.”

In a private conversation with the owner of Sharkeez, HBDRA Spokesperson Kim Kramer, was assured that Sharkeez is sincerely interested in establishing new guidelines to accommodate the Chief’s concerns and will work diligently toward that goal.

The HBDRA board was given a presentation by Sharkeez with several innovative and pro-active suggestions to cut down on drinking and driving, reduce DUI’s and keep our community safe. It is a good start. The HBDRA encourages all Downtown late night bars to look at ways in which they can make our streets and community safer.

The City of Huntington Beach is currently the #1 city in the entire state for alcohol related traffic accidents (click HERE) – that must change.

STATE INVESTIGATES SHARKEEZ FOR DUIs

FEBRUARY 3, 2011 The State of California Department of Alcohol Beverage Control (ABC) is investigating Downtown HB restaurant/bar, Baja Sharkeez, for allegedly being associated with too many DUI’s.

The Huntington Beach Independent broke the story on February 1st – to view the article, click HERE.

The HBDRA did its own DUI Analysis at the beginning of 2010 using crime statistics provided by the HBPD for the nearly two year period from January 1, 2008 through November 20, 2009. The study concluded that Sharkeez, at that time, was the #1 establishment allegedly contributing to the DUI problem in Huntington Beach, according to police data.

According to the HB Independent article, Sharkeez owner, Ron Newman, disputes the findings and concludes that the numbers can not be directly linked to his establishment. That would apply to the HBDRA analysis as well, and the HBDRA recognizes the relevance of his conclusions and those of the HBPD, hence we support a fair and impartial investigation.

The HBDRA analysis looked at the raw number of DUI’s and also the “per capita” numbers based on occupancy, evaluating all establishments that had more than 10 associated offenses according to the HBPD data. Based upon these two criteria, Sharkeez was rated #1 in both categories. And based on the establishments included in the study, Sharkeez was associated with 27.4% of the total DUIs (more than 3x as many) as compared with 8.3% if everything was distributed equally among all establishments in the study.