May 21, 2009

Ex-club owners sue city for discrimination

BY BEN SCHMITT
FREE PRESS STAFF WRITER Three owners of a former downtown Detroit nightclub sued the city Wednesday, accusing the head of the city's building department of squeezing them for contributions to then-Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick's campaign fund and harassing them with unfair ordinance violations because two of its owners are white.
The owners of the Rhino, in the neighborhood formerly known as Harmonie Park, also testified in November before a federal grand jury, which is investigating city corruption.
Wednesday's lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Detroit, alleges racial discrimination because the building's landlords -- the Detroit Economic Growth Corporation and the Detroit Downtown Development Authority -- wanted a black-owned business to occupy the space. Two owners, Mark Hausner and Don Baer, are white. The suit seeks an unspecified amount in damages.
According to the lawsuit, on June 6, 2007, the owners got notice that their licensing permits would be suspended for alleged code violations, "despite the fact that other restaurants in the area, which were majority black-owned, were not being treated in the same manner."
Hausner, Baer and a third owner, Jeff Emery, claim Amru Meah, a Kilpatrick appointee who headed the city's building department, offered to help them with permit and licensing problems if they bought tickets totaling $6,800 to attend a fund-raiser for Kilpatrick, who was then mayor.
David Steingold, a lawyer for the Rhino owners, said the club was later evicted -- he says unfairly -- by the Detroit Economic Growth Corporation -- a quasi-government agency -- in a rent dispute, even after the owners bought the tickets.
"This also is clearly a case where our clients were deliberately excluded from this new business entertainment district, in large part because the ownership was two-thirds Caucasian," he said.
Meah has previously denied the allegations. Krystal Crittendon, the city's corporation counsel, could not be reached for comment.
Contact BEN SCHMITT: 313-223-4296 or bcschmitt@freepress.com



I don't know if it was racism, but, they did get squeezed for a lot of money. I hope they get whatever they have coming to them.