Revere rolls back bars’ closing time to 1 a.m.

REVERE – The License Commission voted Thursday to roll back closing time for bars and alcohol serving establishments an hour to 1 a.m., prompting bar owners to promise a legal fight.Local attorney Sheri Murray said she will go to Suffolk Superior Court on behalf of bar owners to seek a court order blocking the rollback.Murray said she anticipates representing four, probably five, of the dozen bars, restaurants and other local establishments affected by the vote. She is not sure when the injunction will be filed.”It’s arbitrary and capricious,” she said of the commission’s decision.But Commission Chairman Michael Pepe said his vote for the roll back was swayed in part by bar owner Dan Dillon’s comment at a Jan. 10 hearing that the “transformation of a customer from 1 a.m. to 2 a.m. is like Jekyll and Hyde.”Pepe also said he was impressed by the testimony of a Peabody police officer at the January roll back hearing who said that city’s effort three decades ago to set an earlier closing time reduced traffic accidents.However, Pepe acknowledged before casting his vote that “there will be some sort of financial impact” as a result of the commission’s action.Pepe and fellow commissioner Thomas Henneberry and Linda Guinasso listened for 80 minutes last month while a half dozen police officers and elected officials spoke in favor of a roll back and a half dozen bar owners spoke against it.One of the opponents, Bill Dolan, made his views known again following Thursday’s vote by shouting out from his seat in the City Council Chamber, “You’ll put a lot of people out of business.”The vote leaves local late night drinkers with Saugus and Boston as their destinations. Lynn’s Licensing Board rolled back closing time an hour to 1 a.m. at the year’s start over the objections of bar owners who have mounted repeated legal challenges to the rollback.Like their Lynn counterparts, Revere bar owners argued the roll back would saddle them with economic hardships. They said the commission should continue to exercise its authority to roll back bar bars’ hours on a case- by-case basis.”By rolling back all licenses you use too wide a brush. This is punishment for owners who run a tight ship,” Charles Balliro, an attorney for bar owners, said at the commission’s Jan. 10 rollback hearing.But police and elected officials said rolling back hours will reduce drunken driving incidents and bar brawls.They also said Lynn’s decision to set a 1 a.m. closing time compelled Revere to do the same or, in the words of Griswold Street resident Maryann Zizzo, “We’ll be a magnet for last call partiers.”