Article appearing in tomorrow’s St. Petersburg Times:
In the city’s first weekend with longer drinking hours, police saw a marked uptick in calls for service.
They responded to 131 calls after 2 a.m. on Saturday and Sunday mornings, a 22 percent increase from the previous weekend. Those calls resulted in 38 incident reports after 2 a.m., up from 23 last weekend.
The increase validates St. Petersburg police Chief Chuck Harmon’s warning to the City Council before its May 6 vote to extend bar and club closing times from 2 a.m. to 3 a.m. Harmon said the extra hour would require more officers to work later into the morning because there would be more incidents. Continue reading here.
