When four burly Sheriff's Deputies stomped into Smiley's Saloon in Bolinas last Saturday evening at about 8:30, "We were having a merry old time and then it was like the marines coming into a mud hut in Falluja" a grizzled man said. "All of them had their big long multi-D-battery flashlights held on their shoulders like so many clubs ready to crack your head open for nothing. And the lights were on! You could read fine print on a contract!"
"What are you guys doing?" shouted the bartender. "We're doing an ABC check," the bartender said they said the next day, still upset and piqued, banging things around and frantically scrubbing the bar with a bar rag. "They came into the bar like they were looking for a fight, then going into the corners shining their flash lights, going into the bathrooms, shining their lights. I kept saying, 'What is the problem officer', 'What is the problem officer?' I wanted to know if I could call the owner. I'm in charge here. They kept saying, "There is no problem Ma'am' and 'No ma'am' and 'Yes Ma'am'. She stood up tall when she said "Ma'am" "What kind of an ABC check was that," she sneered
The Alcoholic Beverage Commission occasionally performs anonymous checks of places where alcoholic beverages are sold and sold and drunk to see if minors or drunks are being served. "Was anybody drunk?" the Coastal Post asked. "No," she said. "Not really. Well, people were drinking like they always do, but nobody was 'hammered'."
And then she got angry again, "And do you know what they did? (She seemed most hurt by this.) They lied when the owner came! They said I said this was private property and I didn't say that, I said, "What is the problem?" and she slammed a wayward ketchup bottle into place.
The Saloon's owner is also the publisher of the Coastal Post.
"They should be glad I was there" she shouted at me as if the Coastal Post was arguing and it wasn't. "I've probably stopped a riot three or four times keeping certain people in line. I won't say who, but you probably know them. And then they threatened to issue a citation for a dog being in the bar! Can you imagine that? I couldn't see the dog. I guess they didn't want to impound the mangy mutt and take it to Novato and hold it for evidence.
When the owner got there everything had calmed down. Nothing was hurt except, apparently, the sergeant's feelings. "Your staff aren't very friendly," he complained." Sheriff Doyle apparently was sick of drunks and decided to "make Bolinas and Stinson a priority." The owner told the Coastal Post "We are lucky if we have one or two deputies in all of West Marin and then we get four hanging out in front of the bar for hours".
No one had ever heard of an Sheriff/ABC check in Bolinas by uniformed deputies with police cruisers parked in the street. There had been no check at The Sand Dollar in Stinson or The Western in Point Reyes Station. The Forest Knolls Lodge could not be reached.
A woman had been cited for parking on the wrong side of the road. Actually a very beautiful, distinguished looking blonde certainly an oddity in downtown Bolinas on Saturday night or any night for that matter. "It was stupid of me," she said he next day. "It was all my fault." The bartender told the Coastal Post the blond was pretty pissed off the night before.
On Sunday there was a notice on the bar mirror for all bartenders to be careful about parking and to not let dogs into the bar and be nice to deputies until things calmed down.
The offending dog and a few of her friends were now safely outside the bar room but sprawled in front of the entrance, definitely posing a safety hazard for tripping and maybe a police check for Occupational Health and Safety Issues.
"How are you old girl" the Coastal Post asked the dog scratching the old girl's neck. She just lay there thumping her tail slowly on the cement, oblivious to how close she came to impoundment.
