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After multiple shootings and the death of a teenager, Houston Mayor John Whitmire is pledging to crack down on often illegal after-hours nightclubs. These after-hours clubs have become hotbeds for all sorts of crimes.
Sam Houston State University Professor Jay Coons told KTRH that those crimes range anywhere from drugs and gambling to prostitution. He said, "It would just depend on the venue and the individuals who are operating that venue."
Coons also said that cracking down on these clubs is difficult. To avoid city ordinances that would force them to shut down, many of them operate outside city limits, in unincorporated parts of Harris County. Coons says, "A city can pass a city ordinance; a county can't do that. That's why you find a lot of these businesses operating out in the county."
Many of these clubs also operate on a Bring Your Own Bottle, or BYOB, model, in order to skirt around Texas liquor license laws.
Coons likened these clubs to the wild house parties of the '90s and early 2000s, except thanks to the internet, they're much worse. He said, "It can get out of hand, and especially with social media, it's no longer word of mouth. You can broadcast the availability of this venue throughout the entire city."
He says any laws aimed at shutting these clubs down would have to come from the state legislature, and they'd have to be written very carefully to avoid harming legitimate businesses that sell alcohol, like legal liquor stores and even grocery stores.