JERSEY CITY: Gay Bar Owner Claims Extortion Attempt By City-Contracted Trash Removal Company

Wolf Sterling, owner of Pint, Jersey City’s only gay bar, claims that workers from the city-contracted trash removal service have threatened his staff with violence unless they are given free alcohol in return for hauling away his recyclables. The Jersey Journal first reported on the incident several days ago:

Sterling said the two men approached one of his bartenders in the early-morning hours of Aug. 14 and said they weren’t allowed to take his refuse anymore but they would keeping doing it for free liquor. Sterling said the two men work for Regional Industries, which the autonomous Jersey City Incinerator Authority pays $9.2 million annually to haul the city’s garbage and recyclables. The bar owner took his complaint to social media, recounting his allegations on Facebook, when his complaints to the JCIA went nowhere, he said. “If you don’t make a fuss over something, it just continues,” he told The Jersey Journal. Peter Roselle, Regional’s president, said he is looking into the accusations, which he called “unacceptable.”

Yesterday Sterling returned to Pint’s Facebook page with a claim that the trash company has threatened to “retaliate” against him if he pursues a formal complaint. He writes:

You know we try to have a fun, cheery bar but this guy (pictured) isn’t helping. He is a city sanitation worker who began attempting to physically intimidate our staff and making threats against Pint in order to get bribes. Sorry, we don’t play that way. We’ve asked the Jersey City Incinerator Authority who manages him to help. They told us if we pursed the complaint they’d retaliate. That wasn’t very nice. We asked City Hall for help. Nothing came of that either. So, we’re asking our friends to share this post so this story gets shared far and wide. If we can’t get results by asking nicely, maybe a little public pressure will help. Do us a big favor, like this post and share it with your friends. That way if Wolf or Tommy end up buried in the Meadowlands you’ll know where to find us!

The above-linked Facebook page, which has since been viewed over 45,000 times, includes surveillance video of the men banging on the door of the bar. Sterling told me by phone this morning that he has now been personally called by the mayor of Jersey City, as well as the president of the city council.

DISCLOSURE: Sterling is an acquaintance of mine and I have patronized Pint several times. (It’s a fun little bar!) Sterling is a “proud” member of the Sisters Of Perpetual Indulgence and San Franciscans might know him as Sister Betty Does. He opened Pint in 2009 in the location of the longest continually-operating bar in New Jersey, which first opened in 1911 and operated as a speakeasy during Prohibition.



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