When Massachusetts passed stricter sprinkler regulations in 2004 in the wake of the deadly nightclub fire at The Station, there were about a dozen Fall River businesses that needed to be retrofitted with costly systems.
Under the new law, any nightclub, dance hall, discotheque or bar with capacity of more than 100 people had to install sprinklers. Arriving at a definition of those facilities that everyone can agree on has not been easy, however, as evidenced by the plight of one of those Fall River establishments, the Beira Alta Restaurant.
The two-floor, Plymouth Avenue facility – also used as a function hall, with its rows of tables and corner stage – is not a “nightclub” as it was labeled by the Fall River Fire Department, co-owner Alfred Sarmento said last week.
Since the law was enacted, similar complaints have been recurring from businesses statewide, said Massachusetts Fire Marshal Stephen D. Coan, who’s a member of the Massachusetts Fire Safety Commission. After The Station fire, which claimed 100 lives, the commission went through a comprehensive review of Massachusetts fire codes for nightclubs before penning the sprinkler legislation. The mandate was one of 30 recommendations that it produced.
“One of the early problems that we came up with was that the definitions of discotheque, dance halls, they’re very broad in nature,” Coan said, adding that the definitions come from federal guidelines. “And what we found very early is that in this industry, the entertainment industry, there’s a lot of morphing between what might be considered a restaurant and what might be considered a bar.”
The state legislation gave the power to interpret the law to municipal fire chiefs, of which there are 367 in the state, he added. So for that reason, the commission also set up the Automatic Sprinkler Appeals Board.
“That allowed for any parties aggrieved by the decision of the local head of the fire department to appeal the decision,” Coan said. So far, 375 appeals have been filed from 136 communities.
There have been 17 reversed orders so far, but the lion’s share of appeals have ended in prehearing mediation. For that reason, there have been 222 withdrawn appeals, Coan said.
Of the remaining appeals, 80 were rejected on procedural grounds and 14 are still awaiting a hearing, he said. The board has used the individual cases presented by business owners to develop precedence for its handling of appeals on the question of what constitutes a nightclub.
Beira Alta’s appeal was denied in 2006. Other Fall River appeals led to reversal of the fire department’s orders – the Italian Progressive Club on Slade Street, for example, won an appeal after a new building inspection lowered its occupancy to 98 people.
It’s difficult to say just what affect the 2004 law has had on businesses throughout the Bay State, Coan said. With 367 fire departments, he’s had trouble getting a large enough response to estimate how many systems have been installed.
In Fall River, most of the businesses that qualified as “nightclubs” have capacities below 100 people, so they’re exempt, Fire Department Capt. Maurice Reney said last week.
“Most of our bars are under that amount,” Reney said. “Of the ones that are over that amount – there’s probably 10 or 12 – as soon as they knew that law was passed they contacted sprinkler contractors and started the work immediately. Others kind of dragged their feet. I don’t know if they thought the law was going to be repealed or if there was going to be a bigger grace period, because it is an expense of $30,000 to $60,000.”
For Beira Alta, which has a basement level with only one exit, the price was steeper: Sarmento pegged the installed system at $100,000. That’s had a significant impact on his business, which is already under strain from a tough economy – he’s cut the number of employees from 30 to about 12, he said.
Sarmento, whose business has been in Fall River for 31 years, still doesn’t understand why restaurants similar to Beira Alta’s size – a few that also run weekend entertainment – were not required to install sprinklers.
“I’m not out to hurt anybody, but what’s fair for one is fair for another,” he said.
The fire department’s Reney, however, says Beira Alta wasn’t discriminated against and notes that the state appeals board made the final decisions.
A few restaurants “won their appeals, but Beira Alta lost,” he said. •
