MORGANTOWN — Last May, it was announced by bar ownership that The Back Door would close its doors at 485 High Street after more than three decades in business.
Two months later, Casa D’Amici hit social media to announce it, too, would be vacating the building at 485 High Street and moving to the former home of Lotsa Mozza.
Now we know why — officially.
Primanti Bros. wants to be downtown.
During its December meeting, the Morgantown Board of Zoning Appeals granted the Pittsburgh-based restaurant and bar chain a liquor license — officially described as a conditional use permit to open a restaurant/private club — for the 485 High Street location.
The establishment will occupy roughly 6,665 square feet comprised of the entire first floor of the three-story building as well as a portion of the basement to be used as a prep kitchen.
This will be the chain’s second Morgantown location. There are currently 45 Primanti Bros. locations spread across four states.
“If you’ve been to our Suncrest Towne Centre location, this will be very similar. We’ve had unbelievable success in Suncrest and we think this is the next opportunity in Morgantown,” Primanti Bros. CEO Adam Golomb said, adding, “We think this is an opportunity to uplift the entrance to High Street.”
Board members pointed out High Street and Suncrest Towne Centre are totally different environments.
Golomb said the chain operates in several college towns and has zero tolerance for serving underage patrons. Further, he said the business regularly checks up on its servers using a third-party service.
“If an employee fails that test, they’re immediately terminated,” Golomb said, later adding, “We’re not going to be a rowdy bar. That’s not the brand. We have intense training for all the staff. All our managers are trained on proper service — cutting people off when they need to be cut off. It’s important. We have 45 liquor licenses. We can’t have one bring the whole thing down. We want to be a plus to this community, not a nuisance.”
Speaking of liquor licenses, that’s become a bit of a hot topic of late.
The Morgantown Planning Commission held a study session following its Jan. 11 meeting to consider amendments to planning and zoning code surrounding the “restaurant/private club” use.
On Jan. 2, about two weeks after the BZA’s vote, Morgantown City Council approved on the first reading an ordinance suspending enforcement of Subsections E and J of Section 1331.07(27) of city code.
Those subsections mandate an establishment must be able to demonstrate 60% of its revenue comes through food and non-alcoholic beverage sales to receive a liquor license, and that it must submit quarterly reports to the city demonstrating the breakdown of food and alcohol sales.
That ordinance will be up for second reading during Tuesday’s regular meeting.
In addition to the city’s BZA, the location must receive approval from the West Virginia Alcohol Beverage Control Administration.
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