Bar Louie's "Significant Donation" to the Community

Bar Louie got its liquor license back this morning.

From The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel:

The Milwaukee Common Council swiftly approved a liquor license renewal this morning for the popular Water St. tavern, just a week after a paperwork mix-up forced the bar to temporarily shut down for what could have been five weeks. Aldermen acted unanimously and without debate, in a special meeting that lasted less than 15 minutes.

Of course, it was a short meeting. It's August!

Bar Louie will reopen at noon with a celebration that includes free appetizers until 5 p.m., said Ari Domnitz, regional sales manager for the tavern's parent company. The bar also will make "a significant donation" to Second Harvest, based on an undetermined percentage of today's sales, and will work out a long-term arrangement for continued donations to the food pantry, Domnitz said.

In other words, Bar Louie wants to pack the place today.

If the free appetizers aren't enough to get patrons there, then the donation to Second Harvest might be an incentive.

Tavern managers see the contributions as a way of giving back to the community, because "the city of Milwaukee came to their rescue," Bar Louie attorney Michael Maistelman said. If aldermen had not agreed to interrupt their August recess for today's meeting, most of the bar's 90 employees would have been out of work until after Labor Day, he said.

Tavern managers are REALLY grateful that aldermen interrupted their recess.

All's well that ends well, I guess.