JP's, a Glover Park strip club that's been closed for more than five years -- and that some neighbors had hoped would stay closed -- says it will reopen for business Friday at 5 p.m.
An attorney for JP's told News4's Mark Segraves on Thursday that the club had obtained the final permit needed to reopen.
JP’s offered nude dancers for more than two decades until a fire in 2008 closed the club. Now new owners plan to reopen the strip club with some changes that have neighbors worried.
“The new owners appear to be constructing a kind of club we’ve never seen in Northwest and we certainly don’t have here,” Advisory Neighborhood Commissioner Jackie Blumenthal said.
Glover Park is home to upscale restaurants and grocery stores, and some say the new nightclub on Wisconsin Avenue doesn’t fit in anymore.
“It is surprising because this is such a family neighborhood, and students as well, so I’m surprised there is a clientele in this neighborhood,” resident Samantha Brotman said.
What’s going to be so different about the strip club from all the other strip clubs in Northwest is that there will be private dancing rooms and table top dances.
The D.C. agency that regulates bars refused to hold a public hearing prior to opening, Blumenthal said.
“We feel we are being forced as an experiment,” Blumenthal said. “This place will open and we will see how bad it gets or not and we wish we could have more of a say before these changes take place.”
The owner of the club told News4 the private rooms won’t have doors, so they’re more like alcoves, and they are allowed under D.C. law.
A spokesperson for the Alcoholic Beverage Regulation Administration said no public hearing is required because JP’s is in full compliance with D.C. regulations and has had a license for years.
Not all residents oppose JP’s reopening.
“If the door is closed, and the business is inside and not bothering any one on the streets, I’m not making an issue of it,” resident Patricia Bitondo said.
Some point out that another strip club has been operating across the street for decades without any real problems although Good Guys does not have table dancing or private rooms.
Follow Mark Segraves on Twitter at @SegravesNBC4
Photo Credit: NBCWashington.com