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Mayor Adams’ office set meeting with troubled Brooklyn venue and governor’s aide
over its liquor license
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MAYOR ADAMS’ OFFICE SET MEETING WITH TROUBLED BROOKLYN VENUE AND GOVERNOR’S AIDE
OVER ITS LIQUOR LICENSE



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By
Jon Campbell

Published Mar 29, 2023

Modified Mar 29, 2023 at 3:45 p.m.

38 comments

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By
Jon Campbell

Published Mar 29, 2023

Modified Mar 29, 2023 at 3:45 p.m.

38 comments

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In the universe of New York City music venues, Avant Gardner is a behemoth.

Its total capacity of roughly 6,000 people — in the heart of an industrial
neighborhood in Brooklyn — lags only behind arenas and stadiums like Madison
Square Garden and Barclays Center in terms of size. And it’s enjoyed the support
of a number of local elected officials since opening full time in 2017,
including Mayor Eric Adams. His close friend, Brooklyn power broker Frank
Carone, was Avant Gardner's attorney before serving as the mayor's chief of
staff last year.

But the venue, which is home to the popular outdoor concert space known as the
Brooklyn Mirage, has found itself in a near-constant battle with the State
Liquor Authority — which controls Avant Gardner's ability to sell alcohol, one
of the cornerstones of its business model. Over the past five years, SLA
regulators have repeatedly voiced concerns about what they have called "rampant"
drug use and a number of deaths among people who attended events at the
facility. Avant Gardner’s liquor license is due for renewal in May.

The owner of the venue, Juergen “Billy” Bildstein, claimed his business has been
targeted by the SLA, pointing to a heavy fine and the costly implementation of a
special monitor to observe its operations. But in July, with the help of the
mayor’s office, Bildstein secured a rare and private meeting with a group that
included Ingrid Lewis-Martin, the mayor’s chief adviser, and Kathryn Garcia, a
top aide to Gov. Kathy Hochul who oversees the SLA, according to emails and
documents obtained by Gothamist through a freedom of information request, as
well as interviews with public officials.

WNYC's Albany reporter Jon Campbell discusses his findings on "Morning Edition":




The governor’s office would not divulge the specifics of what was discussed. But
records show Bildstein shared documents with the aides accusing the SLA of
“harassing'' his business and looking for reasons to “harm or close” it, and
courted their support for ending the monitor requirement early. In response to a
follow-up email the next month, Lewis-Martin wrote to Bildstein and the
governor’s office.

“We are hopeful that under this Governor businesses will be treated fairly by
SLA,” she wrote.

New York’s liquor authorities have cited ongoing safety issues as the reason for
their concerns about Avant Gardner. In a 2020 court filing regarding a permit
dispute, an SLA attorney accused the venue of operating as “a place for
teenagers and young adults to get high on Ecstasy, Ketamine and other drugs
while loud music plays.” Last year, small bags and wrappers collected at the
venue tested positive for methamphetamine, cocaine, ecstasy and heroin,
according to a report submitted to the SLA by an outside monitor.

> We are hopeful that under this Governor businesses will be treated fairly by
> SLA.

Ingrid Lewis-Martin, mayor’s chief adviser

More than 1,600 people were treated at the venue for intoxication or an “altered
mental state” — a condition often tied to drug use — from 2018 to mid-2022,
according to SLA records and internal Avant Gardner data shared with the
governor’s office. At least 88 people were transported to local hospitals during
the same period. That includes a year-and-a-half-long period when the venue was
closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.




Governor Kathy Hochul speaks, joined by Mayor Eric Adams, as she delivers
remarks about their joint effort to combat gun violence at the High Intensity
Drug Trafficking Areas (HIDTA) office on August 24, 2022 in Manhattan. Their
joint appearance came a month after Adams' aides arranged a meeting with
Hochul's aides on behalf of owners of Avant Gardner.

Photo by ANGELA WEISS/AFP via Getty Images

Three people attending separate Avant Gardner events went on to die of
accidental drug overdoses — a 41-year-old man in 2017, a 21-year-old woman in
2018 and a 23-year-old woman in 2021, according to police records obtained by
Gothamist. The city Office of the Chief Medical Examiner confirmed the cause of
all three deaths was related to MDMA (better known as ecstasy or molly)
consumption, as well as methamphetamine in the case of the 23-year-old.

The SLA was notified of the deaths in 2017 and 2018, but never received a
referral from any police or health authorities about the case in 2021, according
to William Crowley, a spokesperson for the state authority. He said the SLA did
not become aware of the additional death until Gothamist inquired about it.
Police records show the 23-year-old woman was transferred by private ambulance
to Wyckoff Heights Medical Center, where she was pronounced dead 18 hours later.
Police weren’t notified until the following morning, and only because the
woman’s aunt — not the venue, hospital or private ambulance company — reported
it.

In another incident, a female employee reported losing her memory in the early
morning hours while working at the venue on Sept. 11, 2021, according to police
records. When she came to, she said she was disoriented and struggled to speak.
She said she was later shown a video of an unknown man performing a sex act on
her without consent. The case remains under investigation, according to the
NYPD.

The mayor’s office, however, disputes the SLA’s characterization of Avant
Gardner as a haven for drug activity. In an email to Gothamist, Adams’
spokesperson Fabien Levy praised the venue’s safety protocols — which include
extensive security checks upon entry — and for providing medical care on site.
He said the NYPD has a “very positive relationship” with the venue, and the
club’s owners are willing to assist when police investigate crimes there.

Levy said Bildstein’s July meeting with the governor’s office included
representatives from multiple small businesses in the outer boroughs who, he
said, had voiced complaints about the SLA. But a guest list provided by the
governor’s office refutes that claim, showing Avant Gardner’s owner met with
Lewis-Martin and Hochul aides alone, alongside Brooklyn Assemblymember Maritza
Davila and NYPD Deputy Inspector Mark Vazquez, who helmed the venue’s local
police precinct at the time.



Carone, Avant Gardner’s former attorney and Adams’ former chief of staff, said
he had no knowledge of the July meeting until Gothamist informed him of it
earlier this month. Adams has faced repeated questions about Carone’s past
clients and whether he’s shown them favoritism.

“I certainly would not inject myself into a matter with a previous client,”
Carone said in a phone interview. “I’m not aware that (the meeting) took place,
and I had nothing to do with it and have nothing to do with it.”

Davila refused to discuss the meeting, but confirmed the mayor’s office had
organized it. Avant Gardner is located in her district and she’s been a vocal
supporter of the company in its past battles with the SLA.

> I certainly would not inject myself into a matter with a previous client. I’m
> not aware that (the meeting) took place, and I had nothing to do with it and
> have nothing to do with it.

Frank Carone

That Bildstein was able to secure an audience with Garcia is notable. She is
among the highest-ranking officials in the Hochul administration, with a broad
portfolio that includes oversight of dozens of state agencies and authorities
big and small — including the SLA. Adams narrowly defeated Garcia in the 2021
mayoral primary.



Crowley, the SLA spokesperson, said the authority wasn’t aware of Avant
Gardner’s meeting with Garcia until a Gothamist reporter first asked him about
it last month.

The SLA went on to reject Avant Gardner’s request to prematurely end the monitor
requirement, and Crowley said the governor’s office never discussed it with any
SLA employee.

Bildstein and an attorney for Avant Gardner, Joseph MacLellan, did not respond
to repeated requests for an interview or a list of detailed questions sent via
email.

A second Avant Gardner attorney, Howard Kronberg, did reply — but not with
answers to any of the questions. Instead, on March 21, Kronberg’s firm served a
subpoena to New York Public Radio, Gothamist’s parent company. He demanded any
communication the writer of this story had with various people connected to an
ongoing civil lawsuit against Avant Gardner, which was filed by a man who fell
off a fourth-floor balcony at a different location after he was thrown out of
the venue while intoxicated during an event in 2021.

A DANCING DESTINATION



Miss Honey Dijon performs onstage during Ladyland festival at Avant Gardner on
June 28, 2019 in Brooklyn. Avant Gardner is among one of the larger concert
venues in New York City, capable of housing 6,000 people.

Photo by Santiago Felipe/Getty Images


Adams’ support for Avant Gardner goes back to before it opened full time in
2017, when he was Brooklyn borough president.

The venue is owned by Bildstein and Philipp Wiederkehr, a pair of European
businessmen who previously ran a nightclub in Switzerland and promoted events in
New York City under the name Cityfox, according to an article in Vice. They
began promoting New York City parties in the early 2010s that soon ran afoul of
local authorities.

In 2015, Cityfox tried to throw a Halloween party at the former NuHart Plastic
factory in Greenpoint, a toxic Superfund site, before firefighters quickly shut
it down, according to the Brooklyn Paper. Six months later, the NYPD issued
summonses to the Brooklyn Mirage after it was caught selling alcohol without a
proper license.

That didn’t stop them from pursuing a full-time liquor license when opening
Avant Gardner. At 80,000 square feet, the facility spans an entire city block in
what was once a steel plant in industrial East Williamsburg, right next to a
working freight line that winds its way around warehouses and still-operational
manufacturing facilities.

The complex boasts three separate concert spaces: the Brooklyn Mirage, the Great
Hall and Kings Hall. The venues regularly host some of the biggest names in
electronic music, including Skrillex and Armin van Buuren. DJ Magazine named
Avant Gardner the top large club in North America and 16th best club in the
world last year.

According to data Bildstein sent to the governor’s office, hundreds of thousands
of people attend events there each year.

Brooklyn’s Community Board 1, which reviews liquor license applications in the
district where Avant Gardner is located, unanimously objected to the venue’s
efforts to obtain a liquor license in 2017, raising a long list of concerns
about noise and the previous Cityfox parties. But the SLA’s commissioners
awarded it one anyway (votes from a community board are non-binding), on the
condition that it closes its doors at 4:30 a.m., a half hour after state law
mandates the end of alcohol sales.




Frank Carone, seen here at the opening of Hard Rock Hotel New York on May 12,
2022, had once represented the owners of Avant Gardner before becoming chief of
staff to Mayor Eric Adams. He left the post at the end of 2022.

Photo by Jared Siskin/Patrick McMullan via Getty Images

At the time, SLA Chairman Vincent Bradley acknowledged he had concerns about
Avant Gardner’s owners. But in voting to approve its license, he specifically
pointed to the fact that the owners had enlisted the help of the influential law
firm Davidoff Hutcher & Citron, which has a long history of dealing with the
SLA. The firm also has deep ties to city and state leaders, which includes
raising more than $40,000 for Adams’ 2021 mayoral campaign.

“I’m putting my neck on the line with guys that I am not 100% comfortable with,”
Bradley told Avant Gardner’s attorney, Alexander Victor, at the SLA’s April 2017
meeting. “But I’m willing to do that because of the background that you guys
have representing them. That’s the only reason we’re here.”

Bradley also pointed to a handful of letters from local politicians supporting
the venue, including Adams, Davila, then-Councilmember Rafael Espinal and
then-state Sens. Martin Dilan and Jesse Hamilton. “They obviously know their
neighborhoods a lot better than I do,” he said.

A year later, Adams again spoke in support of the venue, this time for its
request that the SLA allow it to stay open past 4:30 a.m. “Since the opening
last summer of Avant Gardner, I have monitored their operations and have been
more than satisfied with how they have conducted their business affairs,” Adams,
then the Brooklyn borough president, wrote to the SLA.

CLASHES WITH THE SLA



The meeting last July between Bildstein and top aides in the governor’s and
mayor’s offices was the culmination of a yearslong period in which Avant
Gardner’s relationship with the SLA had steadily deteriorated.

By 2020, the SLA had issued 53 disciplinary charges against the venue. The most
serious accused it of maintaining a “sustained and continuing pattern of noise,
disturbance, misconduct or disorder.” The charges could have allowed the
authority’s commissioners to revoke the venue’s liquor license.

As justification, the SLA pointed to the hundreds of people who had been treated
for intoxication and drug use at Avant Gardner — including the 41-year-old and
21-year-old who had died of drug overdoses up to that point.

To settle the charges, Avant Gardner agreed in 2020 to an expansive deal that
included a fine of $100,000 and required the company to hire an independent
monitor to assess its operations on behalf of the SLA for one year. The SLA gave
Avant Gardner a list of seven potential monitors to choose from, and the venue
selected T&M USA, a private investigations firm that had previously consulted on
the facility’s security plan before it opened.



Avant Gardner attorney Joseph MacLellan address the members of the State Liquor
Authority at its Aug. 31, 2022 meeting.

State Liquor Authority

But in the documents Bildstein supplied to the governor’s office, Avant Gardner
claimed it agreed to the deal only because the venue believed fighting the SLA
was a “lost cause.” The documents accused SLA commissioners of using their power
as retaliation for a pair of successful lawsuits the company had previously
brought against the liquor authority in 2018.



One of those suits overturned the venue’s mandated 4:30 a.m. closing time, which
the SLA insisted on reinstating as part of the 2020 settlement. The other
lawsuit allowed Avant Gardner to sell alcohol all night for a 2019 New Year’s
celebration, overturning the SLA’s previous decision to reject the venue’s
request for an all-night permit. In both cases, Avant Gardner was represented by
Carone, who went on to serve as Adams’ chief of staff in 2022. (Carone has since
resigned and is widely expected to chair Adams’ bid for re-election.)

“Why does the SLA try to frustrate Avant Gardner’s business more than others and
intentionally create new obstacles and rules for Avant Gardner when we merely
ask for the same things that the SLA gives to others?” asks one of the documents
Bildstein sent to Hochul’s team, which also cites the challenges the company
faced from COVID-19.

“In what world does an entertainment venue like ours – one that wants to work
cooperatively with the SLA – have to fear the SLA more than a pandemic?”

Crowley, the SLA’s spokesperson, said Avant Gardner’s claims of retaliation are
entirely without merit, adding that the charges against it “were based on
community complaints, referrals from law enforcement, and follow-up
inspections.”

> “Why does the SLA try to frustrate Avant Gardner’s business more than others
> and intentionally create new obstacles and rules for Avant Gardner when we
> merely ask for the same things that the SLA gives to others?

Documents Avant Gardner owner Juergen “Billy” Bildstein sent to Hochul’s team


“The only factors driving our compliance efforts is our mandate to keep the
businesses we regulate and the communities where they operate safe,” he said.

EVIDENCE OF DRUG USE

T&M started monitoring Avant Gardner’s operations in December 2021.

In a March 2022 report, T&M noted some evidence of drug use among Avant
Gardner’s patrons, but also concluded the venue generally did well at deterring
“open and notorious” drug activity.

By June, however, T&M’s regular reports to the SLA show how its relationship
with Avant Gardner began to break down.



In this June 2022 letter to T&M, Avant Gardner made the case that some of T&M's
photos of suspected drug wrappers were actually photos of Starburst candy.




These photos, included in T&M's June 2022 report to the SLA, show what the
monitor believed to be "drug paraphernalia" found on Avant Gardner's floor
during a June 3, 2023, event at the venue.

T&M began raising concerns about possible overcrowding at the venue, a charge
Avant Gardner denied. And the monitor began including photos in its reports of
small bags and wrappers found on the floor inside the facility, which it
believed to be “drug paraphernalia.”

Avant Gardner pushed back. In June, Alexander Victor, the Avant Gardner
attorney, questioned T&M’s photos of wrappers.

“Avant Gardner is not pointing out these deficiencies to suggest that its venue
is completely free of illegal drugs,” Victor wrote. But he claimed some of the
materials were merely Starburst wrappers, disposable earplug cases and Walgreens
pill pouches “more commonly used for necessary medications.”

Unbeknownst to Avant Gardner, T&M collected five small bags containing pills or
powdery substances from the venue’s floor in June and July 2022. The monitor
sent them to a lab, where two tested positive for cocaine, and one each tested
for MDMA, methamphetamine and heroin, according to T&M’s final report to the
SLA.

AVANT GARDNER’S CASE TO HOCHUL’S OFFICE



Bildstein met with aides to Hochul and Adams during the height of Avant
Gardner’s battle with T&M.

The documents he sent to the governor’s office questioned the independence of
T&M’s reports and accused it of charging exorbitant rates – racking up $420,000
in charges to Avant Gardner in five months. They also show Bildstein was
planning to ask the SLA for permission to end the monitorship early, and he was
courting support from the governor’s office.

“(We) believe that requiring T&M to continue serving as an independent monitor
is an unnecessary cost/burden without corresponding benefits,” Avant Gardner
wrote. “At this juncture, the only agency that will continue to portray things
differently is the State Liquor Authority.”

Beyond confirming the date of the meeting and who attended, Hochul’s office did
not answer questions about what was discussed and whether the governor had a
position on Bildstein’s request to end the monitorship.

“Members of our offices meet regularly to discuss various issues,” Hochul
spokesperson Hazel Crampton-Hays said in a statement, referring further
questions to the SLA.

> To my knowledge, no one has died at Webster Hall, at least since I've been in
> this chair. And they have died at your place.


Vincent Bradley, SLA Chairman

In August, four weeks after Bildstein’s meeting with Hochul’s office, Avant
Gardner abruptly fired T&M without first seeking permission from the SLA,
according to correspondence obtained by Gothamist. That appeared to violate the
settlement agreement, which required Avant Gardner to provide the monitor
“unfettered access” to the facility “for a period of one year.”

Later that month, Bildstein emailed Hochul’s and Adams’ aides to inform them
Avant Gardner’s representatives would appear before the SLA in the coming days.
At that meeting, Avant Gardner’s attorney asked the liquor authority to end the
monitorship requirement three months early.

Bradley, the SLA chairman, was visibly angry in his response to the request. He
held up a copy of what would become T&M’s final report — the one showing test
results from the wrappers found at the venue. Avant Gardner’s attorney said he
had not yet seen it.

“They all came back positive for either cocaine or whatever else was involved,”
Bradley said. “And then your excuse that I'm getting from reading the report is,
‘Well, this is just part of the business. This is what happens at Webster Hall,
this is what happens at other clubs.’ … To my knowledge, no one has died at
Webster Hall, at least since I've been in this chair. And they have died at your
place.”

Bradley continued: “The fact of the matter is, in my opinion based on these
monitoring reports, is that your clients could care less what people do in their
establishment as long as they make money.”



The SLA rejected Avant Gardner’s request to end the monitorship and forced it to
choose a new monitor for the remaining three months. The result was that Avant
Gardner went without a monitor for the end of its busy summer 2022 season and
instead had one for the less-busy winter months, when only its indoor venues
were in use.

Michael Mansfield, an executive vice president at T&M, defended its work
overseeing activities at Avant Gardner.

"This monitored entity’s unilateral termination of its monitor was unprecedented
and undermines the authority of the SLA to protect the public," Mansfield said
in a statement.

Despite its adversarial relationship with the SLA, Avant Gardner’s liquor
license is unlikely to be repealed when it comes up for renewal in May. The SLA
processes tens of thousands of renewal applications each year, according to its
annual reports. They are approved administratively unless the bar or venue is
facing pending discipline, at which point they would go before the full board
for approval, according to Crowley.

As of now, Avant Gardner is not facing any pending charges, Crowley said.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

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scrutiny from the state


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Tagged

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eric adams
Politics
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Jon Campbell
Twitter

Jon Campbell covers the New York State Capitol for WNYC and Gothamist. Prior to
that, he covered the Capitol for more than a decade for the USA TODAY Network.
He has twice earned the Walter T. Brown Memorial Award, an honor given annually
by the Legislative Correspondents Association alumni for outstanding state
government coverage. Jon grew up in the Buffalo area and graduated from the
University at Albany. Got a tip? Email Jon at jcampbell@wnyc.org.

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