City gives underground venues chance to go straight

Last summer, promoter Mike Kushnir was on the cusp of throwing his biggest party ever. Iron Rod was advertised as a live music and performance event, and was being held at Open Studios, a large gallery space, during Pride 2010.

Kushnir, who used to organize UBC's now-defunct Arts Country Fair, specializes in queer events. He had secured a special event permit, advance ticket sales were good and everything seemed to be going according to plan.

Then Open Studios got an unexpected phone call from the city. An anonymous caller had complained that Kushnir planned to sell liquor illegally. Kushnir scrambled to clarify the arrangement, which was within regulations, but by that point the complaint had been forwarded on to the fire department.

Twenty-four hours before the event, Open Studios was shut down over safety concerns.

When a similar series of events occurred a few months later, Kushnir became suspicious. Was a rival promoter calling in anonymously?

“The system is open to abuses because it’s a complaint-based system,” says Kushnir. “The authorities will only investigate if there’s a complaint but they won’t look into whether the complaint is frivolous or not.”

On Thursday, Vancouver city council took one step towards making the system friendlier to organizers like Kushnir. Recommendations adopted by city council aim to prevent closures of non-traditional venues like Open Studios, and mandate city staff to assist underground live performance spaces get legal status.

Safety regulations that led to Open Studios' closure will also be relaxed. Currently, venues hosting occasional events where alcohol is served are required to adhere to safety regulations akin to those required of permanent live performance venues, such as nightclubs. Event organizers have complained that occupancy and fire exit rules are too strict.

Not only could easing safety regulations lead to new venues opening, but could prevent current spaces from being shut down. Recommendations adopted by council include a program designed to help venues currently in violation of municipal bylaws get up to code.

Essentially, if cultural organizations agree to work with the city to address bylaw violations, the city will withhold enforcement and potential closure.

In the last year and a half, at least four non-traditional venues have permanently closed their doors, relocated or been forced to stop hosting live performances: Little Mountain Gallery, Roy G Biv, Scratch Records on Richards Street and Red Gate.

“What we’re doing here is that we’re taking [venues] that already exist and we’re bringing them into the legal realm,” explained Councillor Heather Deal, who spearheaded the initiative. “That enables us to protect their right to exist because right now it is a complaint-driven system. When someone makes a complaint we are obliged to follow up on that.”

The changes are also designed to cut red tape for organizers. They will be able to apply for a single permit for temporary indoor events through a centralized process, rather than having to navigate numerous agencies including liquor licensing and the fire department.

“This is a historic opportunity to fix problems that have been troubling the music scene in our community for a long time,” said Ryan McCormick, a director of the Safe Amplification Site Society. He cautions that some voices have been excluded from discussions.

“We want to make sure that the sorts of culture that have been penalized a lot in the past—typically the louder, crazier dance parties—that those voices are heard,” he said.

“We looked at the Cultural Facilities Implementation Team and we’re concerned that there aren’t any underground music voices. There’s only one music organization included, and they do jazz, classical and world music only.”

The changes were the first of three phases of a broad initiative to modernize municipal regulations in support of cultural events. This includes a full review of the city’s liquor policy—a move that could lead to a new category of liquor license somewhere between a food-primary (restaurant) and liquor-primary (bar). This could potentially pave the way for neighbourhood pubs or licensed cafes.

For Kushnir, the changes represent a shift in the whole way the city has approached cultural events in past. “There was a culture of ‘no’,” he says of the current regulatory system. “You go to the city for the proper documents, which take months to obtain, and from the minute you start to engage the city, the attitude you get is: ‘The answer is no, now what was your question?’”