Stop Pool Hall Plan, Police Panel Urged

A San Fernando real estate broker vowed Wednesday to continue his fight to open a pool hall and bar steps away from a county mental health clinic in Pacoima.

The broker, Henry Romero, said he was not surprised when about 35 San Fernando and Pacoima residents turned out at a hearing at Parker Center in downtown Los Angeles on Monday to urge that the city Police Commission reject his application for a pool table permit.

“You would get this kind of reaction anywhere you go,” Romero said of a proposal to operate a pool hall.

Romero’s proposed business would have a bar, five or six pool tables, a small dance floor and live entertainment. It would operate seven days a week, from 9 a.m. to 2 a.m., in a now-vacant store in a shopping plaza on San Fernando Road.

Area residents and community leaders argued at the hearing that the pool hall, which would share a wall with the San Fernando Mental Health Clinic, would attract loiterers and become a hazard for people seeking treatment at the facility. People going to the treatment center might be ridiculed by bar patrons, they said.

The opponents of the pool hall said the area is saturated with liquor stores, pool hall and bars, which often turn into havens for vagrants and drug dealers.

Romero contended that there is no proof that his establishment would attract drug dealers or cause disturbances.

John Rice, who was appointed by the Police Commission to conduct the hearing, said he will submit his recommendation to the Police Commission within a month.

Romero also has an application pending with the city Office of Zoning Administration for the sale of liquor at the pool hall. A public hearing on that application is scheduled Feb. 25.