A Station Street bar has dropped its legal cases against Chattanooga and will no longer operate in its current location, the bar’s owner said.
The Blue Light has received multiple citations from the city’s Beer and Wrecker Board since opening in 2021. Its owner, local radio host Brian Joyce, has repeatedly accused the city of targeting the club more than other businesses on Station Street.
The club’s doors have been closed since the last weekend of August after a trial addressed five separate appeals by the bar over citations.
Joyce said the business that runs the Blue Light is still active but will not continue operating on Station Street.
“In fact we are finalizing discussions with a new owner to take over the space and open a new concept,” Joyce said in an email. “If all goes to plan, the new business should be open for the holidays.”
Joyce said the decision was made to leave Station Street in the course of its legal proceedings with the city.
Joyce said he is moving onto other projects and leaving Station Street to new owners. His company owned the Blue Light’s business but rented the space at 43 Station Street, Joyce said in a text.
(READ MORE: Blue Light bar in Chattanooga shuts down after state liquor license is not renewed)
“It became very clear that wasn’t going to end, and they were just doing everything they can in their power to hammer them,” Robin Flores, an attorney representing Blue Light ownership company Diceman Enterprises, said by phone. “At what point do you just say, ‘Look, enough’s enough’?”
Joyce let the club’s state-issued liquor license expire in August, records show.
Staff Photo by Andrew Schwartz / Robin Flores addresses his client, Blue Light co-owner Brian Joyce, in Chancery Court in August.Because of the appeals, the club was still able to serve beer at the time it closed, Flores said, though members of the beer board had voted to revoke its license in June.
Chancellor Jeffrey Atherton accepted the club’s voluntary dismissal of the appeals Sept. 21, court records show.
That revocation came after the board found the bar’s management failed to call police when a fight broke out on the bar’s porch area in April. But Joyce said he reported the fight by directly talking to a Chattanooga officer working on Station Street and that the city’s code does not specifically require reports to be made by phone.
(READ MORE: Beer permit revoked for Blue Light on Station Street after reported violations)
Attorneys representing the city did not respond to requests for comment by press time Monday.
The club’s beer permit was previously revoked in 2022, after six reported code violations in its first few months open. After an appeal, the bar was put on probation and ordered to create a security plan with the city.
The club paid $12,500 in bonds to file its five appeals in chancery court, Flores said. That money will cover court costs, and the remainder will go back to Diceman Enterprises, the attorney said. Flores himself worked the most recent appeal case for free, he previously told the Chattanooga Times Free Press.
At trial and in the media, Joyce and Flores have said the city was targeting the Blue Light because it had a largely Black clientele, pointing out that other bars on Station Street had logged more assaults and DUIs.
The city’s beer board rules on violations and punishments for bars with beer permits, though its nine members are appointed by their area’s City Council members and are not required to have any experience in the service industry.
Joyce said during the August trial that the board’s members don’t understand the city’s code and wield their authority inconsistently.
“Never in 23 years of private practice have I ever seen such a goofy scenario,” Flores said. “My feeling is we would have prevailed on this, but even during the litigation they came up and wrote them up eight more times. … It’s a shame that he had to close up, but they just weren’t going to deal with it anymore.”
Contact Ellen Gerst at egerst@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6319.