Mission Viejo : Panel Rejects Plan for Teen Nightclub

Plans for a teen nightclub have been turned down by the Planning Commission, which feared the potential for crime and gang problems if the alcohol-free dance club was allowed to open.

The disappointed applicants say they will probably not appeal the 4-0 decision. Commissioner Timothy Watson was absent from Tuesday’s meeting.

“I don’t want to come down hard on the commissioners because they have a tough job, but yes, we are very disappointed,” club backer Kathy Petrasich said. “But it was worth the effort to try and find something for kids to do.”

Shout West, the proposed dance club and billiard hall, would have taken over a vacant restaurant building in a shopping plaza on Marguerite Parkway near Avery Parkway.

Petrasich and Les Wilson, the other backer of the 600-person-capacity club, had proposed establishing an alcohol-free nightspot for youths 16 and older.

However, from the start, city officials expressed concerns about security, hours of operation, the possible mixing of juveniles with adults at the club and other issues.

At a public hearing last month, Shout West promoters were given a list of potential problems to correct by Tuesday’s meeting. Planners said they did not hear back from the applicants until the commission meeting was underway.

“As the project began to slip away, they said they were willing to change the hours and enhance the security plan,” Commissioner Sherri Butterfield said. “But by then, I had lost some confidence in their proposal.

“I know we are going to hear again that Mission Viejo hates teen-agers. But I think we protected the youth of Mission Viejo” by rejecting the nightclub proposal.

Petrasich said she and Wilson felt it would be a waste of time to revamp their proposal because commissioners were clearly against the nightclub.

“My feeling is that their minds were made up,” she said. “They were afraid of gangs and knifings and shootings. No matter what was said, we weren’t going to get (project approval) anyway.”

No members of the community stepped forward to support the proposal before the commission.

“I’m a little surprised in that,” Petrasich said. “We contacted a lot of people who said they would come down to the meeting and speak” on behalf of the project.

“I was disappointed that nobody showed,” she said.