CB2 Gets Todd English, Hotel Developers By The Balls

Ever wonder what it's like to have Todd English by the balls? Ask Zella Jones, who spearheaded the community effort to negotiate the terms of the liquor licenses for the Great Jones Hotel and its English-branded restaurant Oliver Todd. After months of back and forth between both sides, she presented Community Board 2 with the extensive (read, crippling) terms of the agreement for both hotel and restaurant. Those who ever doubted that the community members who frequent these proceedings could actually get things done were mistaken. Get ready for some stipulations:

For starters, there will be no use of the rooftop, there will be no terraces, boardrooms will close promptly at 8PM, and there will be video surveillance and security throughout the complex. As for the restaurants, the tapas bar will now close at 2 AM daily, and the signature restaurant will close at midnight on weekdays and 2 AM on weekends. No restaurant can accept reservations for parties greater than 20, and alcohol cannot be served before 10 AM. All refuse must stay indoors until thirty minutes before pickup.

Strict stipulations are also in place for events: all guests must enter at Bond St. Those seeking to organize an event with fifty or more people must sign an event contract that agrees to the following: the party must end at midnight, there can be no promoters of any kind, no limousines can park on Bond St. or Great Jones St., and the guest list cannot exceed 125.

Even though DOB policy allows the hotel up to thirty guests per floor, the community managed to get the hotel to agree to set the limit at fifteen. No single room can hold more than five guests, and there can be absolutely no banquet service. There can be no amplified sound in any exterior space, and the hotel must agree to do further sound testing of the interiors.

Finally, there must be someone on duty at all hours to respond to local complaints, and the hotel must meet with the community on a monthly basis from here on out. One board member expressed that he had never seen as successful a collaboration between the community and an applicant, but he warned: “I’m not sure how [the hotel] is going to stay in business.”
—Gabe Ulla
· Todd English Confirmed in Chelsea Nightclub, NoHo Hotel [~ENY~]