The Booze flows...FREELY!

Ugh! Does the corruption ever end? I just got an email from a concerned homeowner/volunteer. Every year, we hold a "Volunteer Appreciation Dinner" for everyone who, well...volunteers. This homeowner told me that at the end of the evening, she saw the bartender handing out unopened bottles of wine to people and they were tucking them into large purses or their jackets- clearly sneaky.

The bartender is our paid employee, and his sole job is to bar tend, which I think is ludicrous. I posted several months ago about the fact that we have waaaaay too many employees and we don't even know what some of them do. Believe me, the minority report of the Board is trying to find out the answers to these mysteries, but when you have a Board majority blocking your every Agenda Item, ya don't get very far.

Well, at least now I know why the Bar is a revenue loser every year- the bartender is handing out unopened bottles of booze to people!

I alerted our Association President, who is a good guy, but at this point I don't know what else can be done. You see, right now we have 6 people on a 7 seat board. We opted to leave the seat open as the director resigned about a month ago, and our election is June 9th. I know 3 of us will be outraged and will want to get to the bottom of it, and the other three are really good friends with the General MAnager and they let her reign with a free hand, and she has a history of doing absolutely zero when it comes to investigating corruption amongst her "staff", or has some "logical explanation".

That's clearly theft and if it can be confirmed, then he should be fired.

Hi Susan,
Yes, we have an "adult lounge" that is open every Friday and Saturday night, plus for Monday night football and special events. We also rent our facilities to non-members for events such as weddings, and the bar tender works then as well.

The bar is a revenue loser every year. Why? For one, there are some "regulars" that think the bar is their own exclusive club, and anyone who is a newcomer is promptly given the stink eye and then the cold shoulder.

I happened to grow up in this association, and when I was about 22 years old, I went with a few of my friends (also HOA members) to the lounge to shoot some pool and drink some beers. When the cash bar is not open, members can BYOB. So we went up there and were harassed by the staff, security guards, and older association members so we eventually left and never came back.

I have received numerous complaints from Assoc. members saying they've gone in, put their belongings down at a table, and then come back only to find somebody has moved their stuff and an angry old man is glaring at them saying, "This is OUR table!" The bartender will ignore people who aren't regulars, and the list goes on.

What really blows my mind is that such an under-used amenity is in need of new leather covered lounge chairs, bar stools, a new $3,000 popcorn machine, and bowls of free roasted nuts and pretzels for the 5 or so people who think they have their own personal "Cheers" club.

I have proposed activities to generate revenue and more demographically diverse usage, only to have the ideas dismissed. I suggested having a wine and cheese tasting night, ten bucks a head, sponsored by a local wine specialty store. I suggested a "singles mixer", karaoke, bunko, all kinds of ideas, but they always have some convoluted and lame excuse as to why it would never work.

As far as the extra bottles of wine being determined as "left-overs" they should have kept the receipt and returned the unopened bottles and applied the refund towards next year's dinner. The entire HOA had to foot the bill for a dinner that about 200 people attended, and I see it as wrong to arbitrarily dole out left-overs on the homeowner's dime.

I imagine this person was doing this to augment his tips. But he may also have been violating the law. While I'm not familiar with California liquor laws I assume you need a liquor license to operate this club especially since you rent it out. There are (at least in Ohio) different types of licenses. Bars can't dispense sealed bottles and package stores can't sell open drinks. A call or visit to the local liquor authority or even the threat of one may get people singing a different tune. As far as the regulars go; the reason they act this way is because it works, I would get a group together and invade the place every night, there is power in numbers.

Michele I know what you mean, there was a strip club that opened north of Cincinnati and the town leaders in an effort to drive them out got the state to rescind their liquor license. So they became a private club that you could join for a nominal fee and carry your own beer in; they would store it and bring it to the table where you could serve yourself in an effort to get around it. Problem solved or so you would think but the state did a sting operation having someone join and carry in specially marked cans of beer. When they were served they were given another customer's beer, same brand just not the ones the liquor agent carried in. They got a big time fine and almost had to close because of it.