Forgive me, but I'm just going to pass on my notes from tonight's Manhattan Community Board Two Meeting. Call it magical realism, call it exhaustion, but you get the news tonight: Chumley's SLA resolution passed CB2 with some real notable opposition. I'd figure around 22/23 for, eight against and two abstentions. Straight forward enough vote, but there was a strained, tinny quality to it.... Tobi Bergman, the Chair, said "Chumley's is gone. It's dead and it's not coming back," before the vote and said he was against the motion. Then he apologized for not stepping down from the chair to weigh in, "but that's how I feel.” Keen Berger, who is also Greenwich Village Democratic Party District Leader, also voted against (but I’ll always love her because she is Harold Stassen’s Daughter). Strange hoojoo. It's like I was watching money make the Ouiji Stylus move….and the moving hand could have easily writ something else. We gotta get that first Beer poured. I pointed out during "Public Comments" that giving up those eight (8-count 'em) "later" evening hours per week means Chumley's is giving up Millions of Dollars in income over decades. That's quite a cost for being a "good neighbor." I also mention the one group who is being ignored in all this: those of us who will work there. Written into the "stips:" 58 seats on the floor and 12 at the bar. 70 seats total. Full time security seven nights a week. All doors and windows closed "at all times." One of the "anti"s reinforced the $1200 rent lie. Said we sold cheap beer and burgers because we were a low rent act selling to a low rent clientele. But we will outflank these folks. As I said at both CB2 meetings, the “anti”s will need us some day. They will come in, sit down and buy a drink. Maybe one of those cheap burgers. And we will serve them. That’s just the way it is. Service personnel, are you listening? Then we will clean their tables. #openchumleys