A New Brunswick businessman says that the city's Mayor, James Cahill, is holding up approval of his liquor license for a sports bar there because he doesn't like the name. So the owner, a Yankees fan, has filed suit in federal court to be allowed to open up the bar, which he plans to call Buck Foston's. Somehow we suspect he wouldn't have any problem opening it up in the Bronx!
Larry Blatterfein, who has owned the Knight Club in New Brunswick for 30 years, says that Cahill, a Sox fan, is "violating his first amendment constitutional right to free speech by holding up the transfer of a second liquor license" from another restaurant in town.
Blatterfein says he met up with Cahill last year to discuss the bar when the Mayor told him he thought the name was vulgar. But Cahill's office denies he has anything to do with the holdup. "Nothing could be further from the truth," a spokesman told the Star Ledger. "The mayor did tell him he did not like the name, however, the mayor also told him he has the first amendment right to the name."
The mayor's office says the holdup has come from the lack of a tax clearance certificate from the state Division of Taxation. "Until we receive that," Cahill's office says, "we can do nothing under state law."
