Landlord Del Hedgepath's much-maligned address at Admiral and McGee, formerly a club called NRG, reopened as Xpressions at the beginning of the year after the city forced Hedgepath to sell off his liquor license due to frequent and often violent disturbances at the club.
The joint lasted three incident-free hours before a shooting on New Year's Day put new owners Eric and Natasha Union on notice. There was a homicide at the club two weeks ago, and our sources report rumors of a possible stabbing at the club last night. Gary Majors, head of the city's Regulated Industries, is now trying to revoke Xpressions' probationary liquor license.
Majors tells The Pitch that all new liquor licenses operate under a six-month probationary period. Xpressions has violated the terms of its probationary status, Majors says, for adversely impacting the character of the neighborhood, and because of complaints that the club at 220 Admiral Boulevard is monopolizing officers' time and energy.
The KCPD reports that it must expend an inordinate amount of police resources protecting the area immediately around the club. Take the stats from Saturday night, for instance.
The KCPD, Majors says, positioned four full-time officers at 220 Admiral and had other officers patrolling the area around the club, which drew a large crowd Saturday night. They counted six traffic violations, nine vehicles stopped and searched, 45 traffic tickets issued (mostly parking tickets), 17 city arrests, three federal arrests, four field interviews conducted related to federal warrants, a drug arrest that yielded 6.5 grams of cocaine, and three vehicles towed.
What's next? Majors says he'll be mailing out an official notice of the liquor-license violation to owners Eric and Natasha Union today. The club can stay open while the couple has 45 days to ask their neighbors in a 300-foot radius to sign their consent for the club to keep its license. If they get approval from 50 percent of their neighbors plus one, the club stays. Failing that, Majors says, he will ask the liquor board to revoke Xpressions' liquor license for good.
One anonymous source tells The Pitch via e-mail that the club has a snowball's chance in Death Valley of getting the neighborhood's support, writing, 45 days cannot come too soon.
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