Hoboken prepared for ‘LepreCon’ bar crawls this weekend

HOBOKEN — Hoboken Police Chief Ken Ferrante said the city is prepared for this weekend’s annual St. Patrick’s Day-themed bar crawl, a privately run event that usually takes place the first Saturday in March.
He says the day will still be “a little busy because it’s still a tradition in this town” even though Mayor Ravi Bhalla announced that five of the city’s dozens of bars would be closed this weekend due to past infractions. Ferrante noted that 127 liquor licenses will still be in use or valid this weekend.
“We met with all the bar owners on Friday, that’s about 60 bar owners in the room and… I spoke for about 45 minutes,” said Ferrante on Wed. Feb 28. “I said, we are talking about ‘LepreCon’ and we are talking about how we can all have a safe day and here are the ground rules.”
He said, “It’s a consistent message, which is; we are not going to have underage drinking. We are not going to have over intoxication or over serving somebody, we are not going to permit brawls, and then also on the streets, we are not going to have any urinating or drinking in public. Those people will be summonsed.”
The State of New Jersey Attorney General’s Division of Alcohol Beverage Control will send 12 to 14 State ABC detectives to Hoboken for LepreCon.