Padlock the doors and throw away the key.

We need business that brings desirable people into the city with an owner who will step up and be responsible, as well as take pride in the area around their business. I agree the city does have enough bars and gas stations.

I hope when you say “desirable people” Summer that your not referring to the 99% African American crowd the club now brings. Let’s go back… When the club first opened the crowd was a total 180 flip from what the crowd is now. But when cops swamp the parking lots, search peoples cars with no reason, stalk customers when they leave to pull them over and of course the 15 patrol cars going thru the front and rear lots as well as the surrounding area they tend to scare the crowd away. I certainly won’t go back to a bar that I saw that many cops in the lots whether or not they are doing a legitimate job.

Due to that, at the end of summer 2004 they invited 105.9FM to do a radio broadcast which of course brought a crowd back to the club. The spring of that year the radio station moved from 105.9FM to 102.7FM and moved their broadcasting station to a further location, which in turn wasn’t drawing the crowd is used to (farther distance from the club wasn’t hitting the local target area) The second year they were open they barely had a crowd because they were trying to keep the crowd clean by advertising rock, country and “non hip hop music”. When bills have to be paid, business is business and you have to do what you have to do to survive. That is why there is an urban radio station hosting their Saturday night party and of course their crowd follows. Between having a subtle laid back and relaxed crowd with very few fights and incidents or having a rough aggressive crowd I’m sure the owner would like to settle for the nicer crowd, obviously due to the city and specific police officers of the city of Wayne they have ruined the dream of a nice business. When it comes down to the “almighty dollar” that Mark speaks of, I’m sure you would agree that the owner would have saved a lot of money shutting down after the first year, instead of investing tens of thousand dollars more to stay open for an additional 2 more years (one and a half of that not having any business at all). Better yet if the city from the get go would have just said no we don’t want you here I’m sure he would have taken his money else where and who knows… maybe Lucky’s in Novi would be his or maybe a nice club out in Pontiac where they get “passive police support” nightly”. That’s right, you go to any bar/nightclub in Pontiac and there are 2-3 police cars patrolling the local area, running in normal routine mode. They are they to assist when 600+ people are leaving the clubs at the end of the night or the occasional fight that may occur. Customers know they are they are respect them as officers because they are they protecting and serving. To compare they are running the same theme nights as us, top40 and hip hop music and attract the same local crowd as well. When customers leave Club Xtreme you will hear “the pigs are out front… or the popo are out front” because the police are abusing their privilege as officers and are harassing the crowd. Would you go back to a club that has an office standing out front, all masked up and holding an ar14 (assault riffle). Or how about police dogs waiting for the customers to pass by? I certainly wouldn’t go back, and I have nothing to hide. And to say “well they need that kind of backup because of the crowd”, the police chief showed up and told the office with his riffle to put it away that it was not needed. Honestly these are plain cases of them over abusing their power.

I find it funny when Mark said “I hate to see a business leave this community” which of course I can agree with but I’m sure the city isn’t happy about all the other vacant buildings around the city. To give an example of how hard it is to run a business in the city of Wayne I will use a local tanning place as an example. They submitted their plans to the city to purchase a building demolish it and rebuild from the ground up a state of the art tanning and spa facility (similar to a tanning a hot tub place in Ann Arbor). Of course the plans were approved, building began, but when it became time to open what the owner had for the city was a day spa minus the tanning beds. Most people know how much tanning beds cost(which is why we don’t all own them and why there are tanning places) and the owner left those out of his construction phase to same some startup cost. The city wouldn’t approve letting him open his business because they felt running a spa was too risky. There were many issues like this regarding Club Xtreme as well before it was able to open as well. 2 years worth of issues! Most of it regarding inspections and of course each time an inspector was called out if was a different guy with different ways to do things. This in turn, turned into doing jobs 3-4 times to get them right for the right inspector.

That leads to this road construction situation I’m about to talk about. I’m sure if you owned a business (I don’t care what kind it is… say a car wash, tanning place, gas station, or even a bar… I’m sure you wouldn’t be to happy when the construction crew dumps 15 foot sand box in front of your building. The owner of the club even asked the construction crew to make a cross walk to customers wouldn’t injure themselves crossing at the corner with all the equipment or trying to make a short cut and cut across the street. The construction crew agreed and constructed a mound of dirt which was to be black topped to be a crosswalk and also double as the bus stop. There are rumors that a city official approached the construction crew and “recommended to him that they tear that out in fear of someone falling off the side of the make shift walkway, injuring them selves and suing the construction company (which had fencing on either side). That was easily enough to scare the construction company and they tore it out the next day.

I don’t know who the above commenters are or what their investment is in the city of Wayne. What I mean by investment is…do you have children in a school in the city, have you lived here for 28 years, do you work in the city. We do! We are emotionally and financially invested in this city. We are also very involved in our son’s school through Booster activities with JROTC and Marching Band. In talking to other parents and peers at our place of employment in Wayne (not a City owned business) none of us find any need for a club such as Club Xtreme in our community. We would be happy for the owner to open the club in another city such as Pontiac, or maybe his hometown of Farmington Hills. As you see, this business owner is only invested financially in the City. I applaud the police for their efforts to protect the citizens in the community. If you think it is harassment, talk to the residents in the senior complex behind the Club, I am sure they will tell you they feel harassed…but by the club patrons. We would rather have an empty building than deal with the reprehensible behavior of these club patrons, 99% of which are not residents of this community.

I have been to Club Xtreme plenty of times, none of which have I ever witnessed any foul behavior of any kind. I am sure there have been issues as I have read, however like any bar there will be issues, as long as beer and liquor are served. I am from Ann Arbor, and we have “Hip-Hop” clubs and the crowds there are mostly from the U of M, and you are guaranteed a fight EVERY weekend. This crowd I have to say is 70% white. I tend to stay clear from there, and feel more safe at Xtreme, because of the crowd, and music. I do agree that there should be a safer route across the street to the parking area. I believe Xtreme to be a great time, and I would hope its skeptics, would join us out one night.

The talk is over.GOODBYE CLUB EXTREME