GLENDALE / BURBANK : Tommy’s Restaurant to Cut Hours : Government: City Council backs planning board and prohibits Burbank eatery from staying open all night.

Years of fights, loud music and rowdy patrons have forced Tommy’s Original World Famous Hamburgers in Burbank to curtail its around-the-clock hours after the City Council denied the eatery’s appeal of a permit to operate all night.

The council voted 5 to 0 Tuesday night to uphold a planning board decision to order Tommy’s to close between midnight and 6 a.m. after operating for 24 hours a day for the past eight years. The new hours should begin within a month.

The restaurant on San Fernando Road has been the site of numerous police calls since it started its 24-hour schedule, which has included reports of attempted murder, gang fights and disturbing the peace.

Councilman Bob Kramer said he has witnessed the problems at Tommy’s firsthand.

“I have been on police ride-alongs where we go to Tommy’s four times in one night to break up fights or to stop people from drinking in parking lots,” Kramer said. “The city cannot afford to tie up all those police resources for one establishment.”

William B. Rudell, an attorney for Tommy’s, said the company has tried to control crowds that gather late at night, including hiring two security guards for weekend nights, but can’t be held responsible for everything that goes on in the neighborhood.

“We have no means of controlling incidents on adjacent properties that have been unfairly attributed to Tommy’s,” Rudell said. “We are very disappointed with the council’s overreaction to the generalized complaints.”

Tommy’s operators applied for a conditional use permit required by an ordinance passed last year that states that any fast-food restaurant operating within 150 feet of a residential zone between the hours of midnight to 6 a.m. obtain a permit or cease operations between those hours.

The planning board set several conditions, including providing security on weekend nights and additional security upon 24-hour notice by police, as well as requiring Tommy’s to pay the city for excessive police response.

The planning board decided those conditions were not met and the City Council concurred.

Kramer said although the company provided security guards, they were frequently “outgunned, outmanned and outmuscled by the crowd Tommy’s attracts.”

Rudell said his client is uncertain whether they will seek judicial relief, but said “it is certainly an option.”