A SOMERSET football club can sell alcohol and hold events until 1am on Friday and Saturday nights after a new licence was granted.
Street Football Club, which was founded in 1880, currently plays its home games at the Tannery Grounds on Middle Brooks in Street, with its men’s first team competing in the Toolstation Western League Premier Division.
The club applied to Somerset Council to amend its existing licence, allowing it to sell alcohol and play live or recorded music until late into the night on certain days of the week.
Despite nearly a dozen objections from local residents, the council’s licensing sub-committee east voted to grant this new licence after receiving assurances from both the club and the police.
The club, which is located in the southern part of the village, currently comprises one full-size football pitch, a youth pitch, a club house with changing rooms, two function rooms and a skittle alley.
Under the new licence, the club will be able to sell alcohol for consumption on and off the premises from 9am daily until midnight from Monday to Thursday, until 2am on Fridays and Saturdays and until 1am on Sundays.
The club will also be able to play live or recorded music until 1am daily (both indoors and outdoors), and can offer late night refreshment until 1am daily, with an extension until 2am on Fridays and Saturdays.
Under conditions agreed with Avon and Somerset Police, events which involve live or recorded music until 2am can only be staged a maximum of 15 times per year, and must be advertised to the police and public within at least ten working days of each individual event.
Numerous local residents lodged formal objections to the plans ahead of the licensing hearing, which took place in Shepton Mallet on April 12.
Fiona Wyatt, who lives on Beech Road, said: “These hours are more in line with those of a inner city night club than a club situated within a residential area.
“To have a club open until 2.30 am on Friday and Saturday would mean footfall in our road until around 3.30am, which is totally unacceptable.
“Similarly, a 1.30am finish on a Sunday would be extremely disruptive for schoolchildren and working people around the club, as would the weekday late nights.
“I appreciate that the club has to make a profit and am not suggesting that they should not have a licence – merely that the late night openings should be more appropriate to the area in which the club is situated.”
Sandra and Neil Foster, who live less than 200 metres west of the football ground, said: “We have lived at our present address for 48 years and are, in
general, supportive of the football club and its operations.
“However, we consider that the proposed licensing hours are excessive and have the potential to create a significant public nuisance.
“We have already experienced late night disturbances and nuisance from the current operation of the club (which we have reasonably tolerated, without making any complaints), particularly during the summer when doors and windows are open (both in our home and the club house) and when patrons of the club are gathered outside, and when music and other forms of entertainment are occurring.
“The club will become a magnet for those seeking late night entertainment and drinking, given that no other licensed premises in Street are open during the proposed opening hours.”
Sharon and Malcolm Perry added: “We feel it is ludicrous that the club would be able to have music playing outside until early hours of the morning. This would cause a public nuisance.
“The speakers are very close to our house and when there are match days, and fun days (which only being occasionally we have no objections to), the sound is very loud.
“We cannot sit quietly in our garden and can also hear it loudly inside the house. To have this going on until the early hours of the morning would be
unacceptable.”
Joanne Stimpson, a director at the football club, said there were “quite a lot of flaws” with the current licence, adding: “Everything we are delivering is for the community and people of Street.
“We want to make sure that the club is as accessible as it can be, and it’s not just restricted to our members and members of travelling teams.
“We now have gym clubs and a lot of young people playing up there during the day, and we use evening entertainment as a means of generating income. We don’t expect anything to change in that respect.”
Ms Stimpson clarified live music would only be provided outside of the club house on three occasions – the annual fun day, a tournament and the end of season presentations – and that a temporary events licence would be applied for to ensure these events were properly regulated.
Holly Colliford, team leader of Bar 1880 (which is based at the football club), added: “It would only be on the rare occasions that we would have any thing on until 1:30am.
“We’ve had to work very hard over the last year to rein everything in terms of the expectations of behaviour are up there, and we by no means want to turn this into a nightclub, somewhere that people can go when the pubs shut. That’s not what we’re about.”
Following a short deliberation in confidential session, the sub-committee voted to grant the licence on the condition that a noise management plan would be agreed to set residents’ minds at ease.
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