The City of Boston will offer free seminars on safety for bars and restaurants as part of Mayor Thomas Menino’s effort to curb a rise in rape and sexual assaults.
Menino held meetings with establishment owners last week, about a month after the Mayor’s Office ordered a temporary ban on under-21 nights in Theater District and Lansdowne Street nightclubs, citing increased violence in those areas.
The city’s Consumer Affairs and Licensing Office met Feb. 9 with area bar and club owners, along with officials from Boston University and Boston College, to discuss what Menino says is a growing problem.
“We need everyone working together on this issue to solve it,” Menino said in a Feb. 9 press release. “We want our residents and students to be safe, and communication between [the groups who attended] is an important step.”
The Boston Police Department reported 23 rapes or attempted rapes and 331 aggravated assaults between Jan. 1 and Feb. 11 of this year.
Though Brighton accounts for a small percentage of these statistics, the BPD reported on its website one attempted rape and 16 aggravated assaults in District 14, which covers Allston-Brighton, during the same time period.
The release also said the city would offer training seminars to Brighton-area venues that would focus on ways to ensure patrons’ safety.
Community Services officer Daniel Daley said there has been an increase in recent months in assaults in District 14.
Daley estimated within the last month Brighton had seen about one to two dozen more assaults than it did at this time last year.
Although he would not say whether the reporting of assaults has become more common, Daley said increased discussion of assaults has encouraged victims and witnesses to report the crimes.
“People report more because of the seminars being given in colleges,” he said. “The idea that victims should report attacks is getting out, education programs are helping and people are taking the advice.”
George Goddard, assistant manager at Harry’s Bar and Grill in Brighton, said he met with city and rape prevention officials last week to discuss ways to prevent sexual assaults.
“Typically, that kind of situation doesn’t occur in a bar, but they feel the consumption of alcohol is connected to it,” he said.
Goddard said he doubts bars are driving the increase in assaults, but he said the city’s move to hold the meeting between bar owners and authorities is an excellent idea and resulted in what he called a “generally open discussion” between the parties involved.
Daley said police efforts to prevent sexual assaults go beyond simply patrolling – they also advise women to use common sense and be aware of their surroundings.
“We usually are dealing with more assaults than rape, and in most cases, we just recommend that women be smart about their decisions, not leaving their drinks unattended or going home with strangers,” he said.
Goddard said most Harry’s patrons live nearby and can walk home with friends, but said the door staff at his bar also offer to accompany patrons to the parking lot or to a taxi.
“A lot of people don’t take us up on that,” he said. “A lot of women think it’s an affront to their independence. Men fit into that category as well, just not as much as women.”
Across from Boston College, the door staff at Roggie’s Bar and Grill ensures safety by watching for suspicious patrons who look out of place among the bar’s usual young professional crowd, according to manager Spiro Dimopoulous.
“You’ve got to keep an eye on someone you’ve never seen before,” he said. “Aside from that, the Boston Police and security take care of things.”
Daley said although the local bars and the BPD are making an effort to increase the city’s safety, many rape and assaults victims know their attackers before an incident occurs.
“Assaults usually take place in the dormitories, homes and buildings rather than outside in the open,” he said.
College of Arts and Sciences junior Jacqueline Hennrikus said she only feels somewhat safe living in Allston and tries to be careful walking home from her bartending job at The Tonic Bar in Allston.
“Sometimes they worry about me walking home alone,” she said. “I usually take a cab. However, I do have this obnoxiously loud horn for when I do walk home.
“Bars in general are sketchy places,” she said, adding women should be “street-smart” and conscious of their surroundings.
This is an account occasionally used by the Daily Free Press editors to post archived posts from previous iterations of the site or otherwise for special circumstance publications. See authorship info on the byline at the top of the page.
