The fines should be in effect year round and half the cops on duty should be walking a beat downtown near the bars where the trouble is most prevalent every weekend. Hard to see who is acting like an idiot when you are driving by at 25mph.

David why do you assume there isn't already a plan to handle the day? Has anyone told you there isn't a plan and if so who?

FAP - there may be a plan but there also seems to be no communication b/w the city and the bars or the public. That means there is not going to be much in the way of cooperation b/w the bars & the city. Instead of cooperating, the city is just really reacting to the decisions of others. That isn't a good plan at all.

RR I disagree I've seen communications, including an open press conference, from the City saying that they're going to have a very strong public safety presence on the first Saturday.

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There seems to a public safety plan and I think the bar owners will fully live up to their legal responsibilities.

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Will the day be better than last year's mayhem? I don't think anyone can say until after the event. The first Saturday didn't start the way it is now and just as it evolved so will the public safety solutions.

FAP - as I said, the city is reacting to the decisions of others. They may have a plan but they developed on their own w/ on coordination w/ any businesses in town. The perils of unilateral action.

Let's hope no one is sexuallly asssaulted or maimed or worse. Don't need flowerr pots thrown. Because without the parade it is now it is all on the bar owner's reckless lust for overkil moneymakng by encouraging the social media. Blood (or worse) on their hands soon enogh. The party wil be fun for proffits, the lawsuits not so much. The law connects the dots.

Liebler has some responsibility for crimes commited this day

Yeah, I'm thinking it's a major diss of Irish heritage. And lepers.

Without the parade this day has nothing to do with being Irish. It is about immature over-indulgence and the Animal House mentality.

Have a look at the letters to the editor in the Reporter. The Grand Marshall from 1998 actually plays the ethnic intolerance card. That is a cryin' shame.

My Welsh teacher, who also taught a lot of classes at the Irish Arts Center (their Féile na Gaeilge / Irish Language Day 2011 dedicated to him) was not impressed by a St. Patrick's day celebration not being on St. Patrick's day. He didn't like co-opting of religious holy days to profit such industries as brewers, chocolate makers, and greeting card makers. The holiday loses all significance in the process.

Nope.

What I find offensive is the city's continued attacks on cultural celebrations in this town. Our effort at promoting Hoboken this Christmas shopping season was abysmal. The street lights looks like they were purchased at CVS.

Lepre-Con is capitalism at work my friend. For some reason the mayor thinks that this town is Madison NJ or something. It's Hoboken. It's where young folks come to get drunk, eat out and do some shopping. It's why 80% of us have moved to Hoboken and 75% of the reason we stay.

You think we move here and stay here for the easy parking and low taxes?

This town is about tourism and it's the only reason why the town is as prosperous as it is today. You would think someone with a PR background would be able to see this - but I guess not.

In reality, the only reason this town is prosperous is all the young to middle aged professionals who live in town and commute to and from NYC. Without them and without nearby NYC, this town would still be mostly vacant industrial properties.

My point is, and you help make it, is that this LepreCon has nothing to do with St. Patrick or being Irish. If the event has nothing to do with Irish culture then attacking it is not attacking Irish culture.

This is all about bars turning a profit.

you must think that Thomas Jefferson and John Hancock went out back and set off fireworks after signing the Declaration of Independence.

I reserve the rest of my time Mr. Speaker.

Yes. I do. If we celebrated a native american holiday where people dressed like indians while they got drunk to the point of vomiting, it would be denounced by every politician in the country. But getting drunk while dressed as leprechauns, well thats A-OK. Why don't the Irish American community (the ones that said I am taking my parade and go home), speak up for the Irish American community, or were they only interested in the money too?

Journey,

Agreeing that it has nothing to do with Irish culture does not mean that it cannot be offensive to Irish americans. There is a wide range of caricatures we could model for any race or ethnicity which would not having anything to do with that culture but would still be offensive. Somehow the Irish are just supposed to accept it.

Art,

You are not wrong. I find the portrayal of any ethnic group as falling over drunks offensive.

I'm also offended by the fake charge that being against this drunken free for all makes a person anti-Irish.

Make sure Liebler pays his dues too. There is no parade. it's on the promoters now

seriously please you have no idea what you are talking about, no idea. The bar owners do everything to make it safe employing extra security and giving free corn beef sandwiches throughout the day. IT IS THE HOUSE PARTIES. Also can the complainers please move out to the burbs. HOBOKEN IS URBAN LIVING!!!!!!!!!!

Just put in some ear plugs and go back to your knitting and you won't be bothered.

HobokenOwl,

Hoboken needs to crack down on that type of permissiveness 365 days a year.

The bar owners will fight it tooth and nail.

I wasn't responding to you. If I had wanted to respond to an old coot, I'd have hit the reply button to your comment.

Sounds like someone is upset with how far his/her HS diploma got them in life.

Old people who do not know how to use a simple reply button should stay off the internet and leave it to people who know WTF they are doing. Next time you think someone is replying to you, let me give you a hint. They will either nest their comment below yours b/c they hit the reply button or they will address you specifically. I did neither you ignorant fool.

@Hobokenold said "I have lived in Hoboken for a while before the jackasses came in!"
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I can assume then that you were one of the Native Americans who greeted Henry Hudson when he arrived in the Half Moon to what would one day be Hoboken's seaport?

Not only can you not foist the bill on them, but w/ no parade there will likely be fewer visitors so that means fewer cars in the garages, fewer parking tickets, fewer moving violations, fewer citations and far less in revenues for the city.

You just made Lenz's head spin RR

I am just going to laugh myself off my chair if I find out that on a net net basis, the city ends up out more money b/c of this bar crawl than it would have been out b/c of the parade.

Jamie Darrah is a made up name, the person who is running the lepre con event is a guy not a girl. Then again with any old email and a pre paid cell phone to protect yourself from scrutiny, you can pretend to be whomever you want?

Actually I have been told a a lawyer that without the benefit of a City sanctioned event (parade) those promoting an event are legally and finacially responsible if things get out of hand.

The promoters and bar owners should be made to pick up the tab for their party not the taxpayers of Hoboken.

Less people, less cars, less violations less chaos, destyruction and mayhem then in the past..... most rational people would consider that to be a good thing. :-)

Yeah Hobbs, go ahead and try and get some 20 year old kid to pay for things. Good luck on that one. The city will spend 100x more on lawyers than they will ever see from the outcome of that suit.

If Jamie Darrah is a ficticious character made up to front this thing, then to me that would lead me to think that someone is trying to limit their legal and financial exposure it this thing goes bad. Some bar owners have very deep pockets and lawyers love to take people with deep pockets to court.

I remember when a developer is the NW invented a phony "grass roots organization" to front for their development plans this could be very similar.

There will be as many people as last year if not more. When an authority like a town says "No" it only makes people want to say "Yes" more. With the parade there would be more control to say the least. For months so many people said "lets work this out" yet nobody did and now this is what remains. So at the end of the day the bars win and the town lost. Simply saying no is a great way to challenge the 20 somethings, it only makes them fight back more. Bad move on town to say the least.

Mr Chadwick, your comment above makes a lot of sense, but where the wheels fall off the wagon with it is where it does not acknowledge the fact that the city had and has a very real safety issue in the mix with the revelry aspect. For many years administrations have tried to reign this in and nothing worked. So moving the parade was the next step. What do facebook group members care, most of them don't even live here, and think Hoboken is where somebody else lives and they go to get stupid drunk. Lax enforcement of drinking related crimes is where it began, danger to the general population and their property is where it went, and the bar owners encouraged it all to the nines. Now it is the city with "the missteps"? I don't agree with that calculus. Having no parade this year should reduce the numbers, if it doesn't because of some facebook groups, it is nothing more than the next step in a progression of something that was very actively not nipped in the bud but rather historically let to get out of hand by bars trying to make money by over-serving the intoxicated, and law enforcement looking the other way. This problem didn't suddenly pop up this year or last year. The tipping point to disaster was easily 5 years ago.

@p1ywood

You said it yourself "administrations". Never has a group of all who would like to be involved gotten together and came to an agreement on it. All the boards in town people sit on work together to find answers. A board for the parade that is evenly picked so you can incorporate everyone in to the discussion would be good. 1 bar person, 1 restaurant person, 1 resident spokesperson, 1 retail spokesperson, maybe someone from police dept that is a resident and a few other people, make it balanced, maybe 8 people 4 pro parade 4 con parade and draw it out and present it for consideration. The worst thing is you can still be told NO, but nobody cared to try to draw it out and you still have NO. Everyone had their own agenda, no one had a plausible agenda for consideration. I know people personally from Ohio that are coming to the Leprecon. This one will be mammoth.

@ Rory Chadwick

Dude, I know you mean well and I agree with your concept for a parade day board. On the other hand, what they come up with better be legally binding, or they might as well hold the meetings in Fantasyland. The town has reached out to the bar and restaurant industries for years about reaching a compromise or working in concert on having the city be safer, but if the administration doesn't propose exactly what the bar owners want to hear for maximum profit, they basically laugh the administration out of the room and get right back to doing whatever they want. And if we ever want law enforcement to get a handle on this, the turnout for the event has to be ratcheted down in size in order to get out of triage mode. Lepre-con is all online now to do a great disservice to the town and those who are championing it don't seem to care what gets out of hand and long as the cash registers keep ringing off the hook and everyone can get as plastered as they care to. Hoboken remains a running joke to those who would trash it. The parade committee is probably thanking their lucky stars their fingerprints won't be on this debacle this year. It will simply be a horror show in green get-ups.

Sure, go ahead and try and violate their right of free speech. Let's see how fast you rack up a million in legal fees w/ that one.

Seriously? Maybe we can have the thought police issue tickets for bad ideas.

No violation of rights.

Just asking yet again those who are making a profit from a sales promotion stunt to be held responsible for their actions.

If the front people for this event are indeed ficticious then you have to think that the people behind them don't want to be held reponsible.

I would also think that those "20 something" people don't like being minipulated by public reations firms to reach into their pockets.

You are right Hobbs, there will be no violation b/c the courts will ignore your request. You cannot prevent anyone from promoting a bar crawl. You can't stop them from holding a bar crawl. You can't stop the bars from making money. You can't stop people from gathering in the privacy of their own homes and having parties. And you can't stop them from visiting town and having fun that day just like nobody can stop you from being a stick in the mud and complaining about things.

And Hobbs, when you figure out a way to get everyone the right to pick and choose what expenses the city incurs we can pay for and opt out of paying for, tell me. There are more than a few things the city spends money on that I'd love to not have to pay for.

Rory can you elaborate on your statement that Jamie Darrah is made up name and tell us who you think is running the show ?

I can't tell you Hobbs, I'm sworn by that almighty journalistic code of honor. I will tell you that its a not a girl and I can tell you it's gaining massive attention and a lot of sites and blogs are all over it. The person in charge is simply filling a void with an idea, pretty simple and its becoming very effective. At this point you could reinstate the parade but this thing is gaining so much press that the parade might as well never happen again because this thing could very well be the next big thing in Hoboken. Best advice I could tell anyone is if you thought the parade was crazy last year, you likely haven't seen anything yet.

Some bars already open on Saturdays as early as 8, others at closer to 9-10 for the brunch crowd. The rest of the bars are almost all open by 11 or 12. I believe they are legally allowed to open at 6:30. How late would you like them to open & are you willing to deal w/ the consequences of having the bars open late again this year? Over the last few years, the city has asked them to open late and they have complied. It didn't help things at all b/c instead of people coming early, standing in line & packing the bars where they could be kept under control and where they had to wait for a bartender to pour them a drink, people just drank in the streets or at the house parties that people started throwing b/c the bars were opening up late. Bars opening late led to chaos.

The bars are not the problem.

The worst thing this town ever did w/ respect to this event was ask the bars to open late. The second worst thing they did was forget to enforce the law the other 364 days of the year.

Who is being duped? Do you really think anyone cares who that person is? Do you think half of us hadn't already decided to thumb their nose at city hall already? You don't get it Hobbs. People have decided that they are not going to let city hall ruin their fun. The bars don't even have to promote this thing and people will still show up in their green regalia. They have the right to do that just like the city has the right to make sure they behave and punish them if they don't.

But yeah, just go tell the bars to open late like they did last few years and see how chaotic things are and how drunk everyone is before they open just like before. Such a smart idea to repeat the same stupid mistakes of the past.

BTW, I think the people who go to bars early on weekends to catch EU football games, the early basketball games or just grab an early brunch will just love it if you now prevent the bars from opening early on weekends. Way to annoy everyone b/c you refuse to let bar owners run their business the way they want to and have the city enforce the law the way it needs to be enforce 365 days out of the year.

Why would the organizers Lepere.con feel the need to invent "Jamie Darrah'" as a phony persona to be their spokesperson ?
This was not a screen name apparently she told several people in the press that was her name and it was her idea. She was not a "20 something " grass roots person looking to have a good time but it looks more like someone paid by the bar owners to front their sales promotion. Apparently if the real person was known to the public may not have been as receptive to the sales pitch. So yes, I think people do care.

I get it Red, bar owners don't want to lose their windfall profits and the came up with a way to try to do it. All that I have seen they don't want to do it responsibly.

I would think that the laws that regulate serving intoxicated people would negate your objections to late openings on one or two days. People come in to your bar you don't serve them more alcohol the law is simple on that.

I think your idea of being more vigrous in enforcing the laws already on the books is good. Hopefully they will kick up enforcement in the next few weeks leading up to March.

I have no problem with people having a good time, unfortunately having a good time has become code for some to have an out of control Irish themed drinking weekend.

The person doing leprecon in Hoboken is not Jamie Darrah it is someone else. The person is creating an idea for the day and telling people to come here for the day. The person is not selling anyone anything merely offering a suggestion, you can't go after anyone for freedom of speech or freedom to assemble. They're coming and the bars will have lines around the corners, all of them. This person who is creating this put the day back on the map, single handily, impressive frankly.

i cross my fingers and hope it will be non chaotic and everyone in town bars and stores can make a few bucks, people drink people spend, everyone in business in town that day will hopefully have a good day.

The name the source prefers to use is Larry Leprecon.

or listen to some good tunes...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FBxnrPAaodI

lane its happening with or without this thing it was only a matter of time before someone else had an idea to capitalize on. Don't blame me, blame media in general. Every site blog in hudson county is running this, not just here.