By Lee Reinsch
Correspondent
The Fox y Moo at 132 S. Broadway will lose its liquor license June 30.
After about an hour of deliberation, the De Pere Common Council voted to not renew the liquor license for the Fox y Moo dance bar when it expires June 30 and to suspend the liquor license for the McLanes Bowl bowling alley for 30 days, starting July 1.
The two bars are in the same building and have the same owner but have separate liquor licenses and act as separate entities.
The council said owner Bryan Kaster also must record his staff carding customers for 30 days and undergo training from the De Pere Police Department.
The council voted unanimously June 25 in favor of the 30-day liquor-license suspension for McLanes Bowl, but when it came to voting not to renew the Fox y Moo liquor license, Alderman Dean Raasch and Alderman Dan Carpenter sided with the bar.
Alderman Scott Crevier did not vote, because he was not at the meeting.
The vote came a month after a May 25 bar fight that resumed outside after participants were kicked out of the bar.
The fight reportedly climaxed with two gunshots fired in a city-owned parking lot nearby.
Several men under 21 were involved in the fight, along with a 22-year-old performer/DJ, who allegedly fired the shots with a handgun that he got from his car.
Reports of whether the gun was fired into the sky or into the concrete parking lot weren’t clear, and only one bullet was recovered.
The conflict apparently started when one of the men “messed with” the performer’s DJ equipment.
Video from the bar shows the men being escorted out. Kaster said he and his staff prevented other patrons from following them outside.
“We thought that was the end of it,” Kaster told the board, adding that he never heard any gunshots.
Police officers said when they arrived, they didn’t find people in a frenzy but simply outside the bar, talking.
“It’s an overreach to paint this as a bar with continuous problems,” said Michael McGuire, attorney for business owner Bryan Kaster. “This isn’t a common occurrence, and it’s not in any way what we condone.”
McGuire pointed out that the city-owned parking lot where the gunshot incident happened was adjacent to bar property and Fox y Moo staff couldn’t see it from the bar.
The business opened six months ago, and the May 25 event was the first time police had been called to the establishment, Chief Derek Beiderwieden told the Common Council at a meeting June 4.
Three weeks after the gunshot incident, on June 16, an anonymous caller reported minors in the bar, according to an officer.
Police showed up to check IDs. Of the 75 people in the dance bar, officers found three to be under age 21.
In one of the underage incidents, one man admitted he got in by swiping a wristband when staff wasn’t looking.
Another said he had his cousin’s ID but told police he didn’t use it and wasn’t asked to show ID, according to an officer.
The Fox y Moo uses wristbands to indicate that a person’s ID has been checked.
While minors are allowed in the bowling alley area, no one can enter the dance bar without an ID and a wristband.
The Common Council heard testimony from several officers who were on duty those nights and saw a brief bodycam video showing an intoxicated woman outside the bar and unable to stand up, which police said proved the bar overserved.
Charges Kaster faces include two counts of allowing underage persons on the premises, one count of unreasonable activity that endangers the health, safety or repose of citizens; and one count of “running a disorderly house” for the combined incidents of May 25 and June 16.