An East Allentown woman again went before City Council Wednesday night to complain that patrons of a hookah lounge are disturbing her peace.
Adnery Delarosa asked for the city’s help to end late-night noise from patrons leaving The Source, which opened more than a year ago at 1006-1026 Hanover Ave.
Delarosa, who first complained to council about the place during its Aug. 20 meeting, returned to ask the city “to revisit the situation.”
“This is all occurring right next to my house,” she told council. “Our bedroom is right next to that. It does disturb our sleep.
“I ask you to think about how you would feel if this was occurring next to your house.
“All I want to do is live in peace and tranquility and I think I have that right.”
Council vice president Ray O’Connell, who chaired the meeting, said police have been called numerous times but have issued no violations against the hookah lounge.
Allentown managing director Francis Dougherty said several members of the city’s administration tried to resolve Delarosa’s complaint, including by arranging a meeting with the owner of the lounge, but both she and her husband refused to attend that meeting.
Delarosa acknowledged they did refuse because “the owner of the hookah lounge was not going to meet with us; it was going to be someone else. Why would I want to meet with someone else? I want to speak with him.”
“It was going to be a manager,” said O’Connell.
“I don’t know what more we can do to help you,” Dougherty told Delarosa. “We have found no violations at this establishment.”
She responded: “Because the police are not seeing it, that doesn’t mean it’s not happening. I live there. I see it all the time.”
Said Dougherty: “If you have new evidence, my team wants to hear it.”
He again encouraged her to “come in and sit down with us,” adding: “We’re empathetic of your situation. But you need to help us.”
Dougherty said that after Delarosa first complained to council in August, he followed up on her complaint with the city solicitor and city zoning officer, adding the latter “was intimately familiar with the situation.”
Delarosa presented council with pictures taken from security cameras, saying they were installed on her house about three months after the lounge opened “because of what was happening.”
Sharing one photo, she said: “Look at the time. It’s 2:04 a.m. and the parking lot is full of people.”
She said another photo shows people still waiting for rides outside the place at 2:36 a.m. “While they’re waiting, they’re still talking."
Her photos have been shared with city police, but they told her “they can’t do anything because they have to catch them in the act.”
She said a law firm representing the hookah lounge has threatened to sue her “if we didn’t stop calling the police and if we didn’t reposition our cameras.”
Delarosa acknowledged the situation has improved since her August appeal to City Council.
“I think they have tried to do some kind of work to muffle the noise,” she told council. “I haven’t heard the noise from inside as much, but there’s still a problem when the patrons leave.”
She also told council the place still plays music really loud, but then turns it off because they know she will call police.
She said lounge patrons park on streets as well as the lot and that the owner of the hookah lounge parks on the sidewalk.
She questioned whether alcoholic beverages are permitted in the establishment and if it has permits for the food that is served.
Delarosa told council the owner has the right to have a business, but then said: “That area is not suitable for that type of business.”
“There’s a balance here between your quality of life and his right to run an establishment [where] it’s zoned for him to run a business,” said Dougherty.
“If we can help facilitate that balance, that’s what we’re here for.”
A hookah lounge is an establishment where patrons share flavored tobacco, through flexible tubes, from water-cooled pipes placed at each table.
After the meeting, Tino Babayan, manager of the east Allentown lounge, indicated he thought Delarosa’s problems with the place had been resolved.
He said the owner spent thousands of dollars to make improvements so Delarosa no longer would be bothered by noise.
Babayan contended that, after those improvements were made, music playing loud inside the lounge — louder than his patrons would ever want it played — cannot be heard out in the parking lot.
He said the establishment closes at 2 a.m. on weekends and earlier on weeknights, depending on business.
He maintained that when customers leave, “they don’t even talk outside. They get in their cars and go home.
“This lady has been lying about us for a whole year.”
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