Bars boost security

COEUR d'ALENE - A pair of downtown bars will be using metal detectors to screen would-be weekend patrons.

Bouncers at Icon sports bar and dance club on Sherman Avenue and Baja Bargarita on Second Street will use handheld metal detectors at their doors to ensure weapons aren't brought into the establishments.

"Hearing people having guns, I don't want customers scared of going out," said J.R. Briseno, manager of Baja Bargarita and the adjacent Toro Viejo Mexican restaurant. "Why have that?"

"Hopefully, seeing (extra security measures) will make people feel more comfortable," he said.

Bouncers there will begin screening customers over the Feb. 19 weekend, while Icon and Underground bar doormen will begin checking for metal tonight.

Jerry Goggin, Icon, Underground and Beacon Pub owner, said the new step is one idea that came from a collaborative meeting between law enforcement agencies, city officials and downtown property and business owners last week to identify ways to make downtown safer.

That meeting resulted from two high-profile gun incidents which occurred downtown since Dec. 27, as well as from a killing less than a year ago outside another downtown bar.

"There have been fights in downtown Coeur d'Alene for 100 years," Goggin said. "Is this something new because someone had a gun and shot someone? Are we overreacting? Maybe a little bit. But is the pendulum swinging? Sure."

Should the doormen discover a weapon, the would-be patron would be denied entrance - not detained - and police would be notified.

Some owners aren't so sure it's the best step.

Aaron Robb, co-owner of the Iron Horse Bar and Grill, said the bar would not be using the detectors, nor would the Moose Lounge according to co-owner Dave Pulis, who worries it might be too soon to implement the measure.

"It's tragic what's happened, but I'm not convinced it's a pattern," Pulis said. "Nobody's been shot in a bar. I understand we need to respond to what's happened downtown, but some of this stuff is overkill."

"I think people driving by and seeing somebody basically wanded down is a bad message," he added.

Both Briseno and Goggin said the screening would occur on weekends, with a wait-and-see approach for additional nights heading into the summer.

Briseno said another protective step discussed at last week's meeting would be to have the bouncers and doormen in communication via text messaging and cell phones to pass along descriptions of patrons who have been kicked out of an establishment.

That way, if they've been kicked out of one bar they could be kicked out of them all, he said, as it's not where trouble-makers start drinking where the altercations occurs, but where they end up.

"I think it's a great idea," said Mark Marshall, downtown on Thursday, of the metal detectors. "There's no need to bring in weapons into an establishment for entertainment. There's just no reason."

But Marshall, who has lived in Coeur d'Alene 14 years, said the metal detectors wouldn't necessarily keep downtown weapon-free.

"It'll keep that particular establishment safer," he said. "But I don't think it will really change a whole lot other than that."

Law enforcement agencies have also began increasing patrols downtown on weekend evenings.

Around 6 percent of police calls for service in 2009 occurred downtown. From Foster Avenue to Lake Coeur d'Alene, and from City Park to Eighth Street, 2,692 of the 39,543 incidents occurred in that area.