Real estate: Strip club awaits OK of license
Written on January 22, 2011 by Rose Ryrie
With a new owner comes a new opportunity to clean up a business’s image – especially one that’s plagued with violence, drug deals and illegal sex.
That might be the thinking at The Candy Store, a strip club at 1104 S. Craycroft Road near East 22nd Street.
Its parking lot was the scene of two deadly shootings within three months in 2009.
Cops raided the strip joint in March 2010 and arrested several employees on suspicion that they’d sold drugs to undercover officers.
Then in July, police nabbed a 51-year-old man just outside the club who was wanted in connection with a string of convenience-store robberies.
Last year The Candy Store agreed to pay two fines totaling $90,000 for violations that included repeated acts of violence, selling or using drugs on the premises and one count of a prohibited sex act, according to the Arizona Department of Liquor Licenses and Control.
Less lurid violations included selling alcohol to minors and failing to follow proper identification procedures.
One of the fines, for $50,000, was paid Sept. 7, and the other, for $40,000, was paid Nov. 29, said Lee Hill, a liquor department spokeswoman.
For weeks, the strip club has been closed – the previous owner had to cease selling liquor Dec. 15 – but if its sign out front is any indication, that could be changing.
“Opening soon,” it says.
“New owner.”
“Full bar.”
“Drink specials.”
On Feb. 3, the Arizona State Liquor Board will consider whether to transfer the license from the previous owner, Steven M. Carringer, to Corey D. Owens, who would operate the strip club through a corporation called Whitefeather Ventures LLC. The managing members of Whitefeather Ventures include Owens, of Phoenix, and Robert Proznik, of Edmonton, Alberta, according to Arizona Corporation Commission documents.
They couldn’t be reached for comment. Attempts to find a contact number for Owens through public records were unsuccessful and several calls to The Candy Store’s phone number were unanswered.
At a hearing in December, the liquor board delayed approving The Candy Store’s license transfer because of public opposition to the application and because the City Council had recommended it not be approved.
Apparently, the recent string of criminal activity at the strip joint has drawn the ire of some residents.
Ellen Brown, president of the nearby Wilshire Heights Neighborhood Association, said that when people who live there realized the The Candy Store would have to renew its license, they decided to file a complaint urging the application be denied.
“Our main concern is the criminal activity at that location, including among the employees,” Brown said.
Particularly disconcerting for Brown and other neighbors is that The Candy Store abuts right up to residential communities.
Brown was skeptical anything would improve with a new owner. She’s not aware of anybody at Whitefeather Ventures reaching out to leaders of the nearby neighborhood associations and letting them know they have plans to clean up the way the club does business.
“I, frankly, don’t think there’s going to be any change in the way things are operating,” she said Friday.
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