EUGENE, Ore. (KMTR) - Downtown Eugene’s The Rok nightclub will stop selling liquor and go up for sale under a newly proposed agreement between the club’s owner and the Oregon Liquor Control Commission (OLCC).
A final decision still has to pass the OLCC, but The Rok’s owner Ronald McKy has signed on to an agreement to give up the club’s liquor license by April 19.
Until then, under the agreement, the club would only be able to sell alcohol until 12:30 AM every day. The club would then have to close at 1 AM.
The club has been known as The Rok for less than two years. However, since October 2011, the OLCC says there have been 43 documented “serious incidents” at the club including several assaults, some assaults with weapons, also drunk driving-related arrests and many instances where club patrons have been served too much alcohol.
Ronald McKy also told the OLCC that he will try to sell The Rok. Whatever happens to club, the next owner will have to work closely with the OLCC to improve the its longstanding issues.
“The idea that we're going to make this a better place, we're going to make this a safe place, is going to be key in terms of whether or not a liquor license is going to be [issued] at that particular location again,” said Mark Jaehnig, an inspector and investigator with the OLCC.
According to the report, Jaehnig and other OLCC representatives tried to work with the nightclub on several occasions over the last fifteen months.
“We want to make sure that the public is safe and that whoever is running a business there is doing it in a responsible manner,” said Jaehnig.
If a new owner steps in before The Rok forfeits its liquor license, the next owner would need to get new permission from the OLCC in order to serve alcohol in the club.
NewsSource 16 contacted Ronald McKy over the phone on Wednesday, February 20t. McKy says he wanted to continue the business, but feels that many of the problems surrounding the club were beyond his control.
To view the entire report, click
here.
