No deal yet for Badlands space

by John Ferrannini

The location of the former Badlands in the Castro is in the process of losing its liquor license just as its landlord and prospective new operator have stopped providing updates on the space’s future.

The Bay Area Reporter published a story February 9 based on interviews with Les Natali, a gay man who owns the Badlands property. He said that Badlands, located at 4121 18th Street, could be open again in as little as eight weeks pending an agreement with TJ Bruce, a gay man who owns a number of nightclubs on the West Coast, such as Splash San Jose and Badlands Sacramento. The San Francisco LGBTQ nightclub closed permanently in 2020 due to the COVID pandemic.

Natali also put the B.A.R. in touch with Cheryl Maloney of Vanguard Properties, who said that several would-be tenants are vying for the former Hamburger Mary’s space at 541 Castro Street, which he also owns.

While Natali and Bruce had said a deal was imminent February 9, Bruce confirmed February 10 that a deal had not been signed, and neither returned follow-up calls the next week. Then, on February 21, Bruce stated in a text that “I cannot speak for Les or the business at this time.”

“Please reach out to him directly,”

Bruce added.

Natali did not return a call Tuesday from the B.A.R. requesting comment for this article.

In the meantime, Hoodline reported that Badlands was forced to surrender its liquor license last week due to inactivity, and that Hamburger Mary’s liquor license had been surrendered on October 31, 2022.

Bryce Avalos, a communications analyst with the California Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control, confirmed to the B.A.R. that the Hamburger Mary’s license had been surrendered that date.

As for Badlands, Avalos stated, “ABC confirmed [to Hoodline] on Thursday that the surrender request was being processed and the Badlands license would be in surrender status soon. The paperwork has completed processing and the surrender is backdated to October 22, 2022.”

That said, the surrendering of the liquor license does not mean a bar could not reopen at the location.

“If the location is able to immediately begin operations, re-activating the license could be immediate,”

Avalos continued. “ABC looks into

From page 1 a lot of questions.”

“We wish we had more historical data to compare it to and we recommend the survey be conducted yearly,” they stated. “The report identifies some 50% [sic] of survey respondent businesses are owned or managed by LGBTQ people. While that percentage may be troubling to some folks who would like to see the Castro have a more LGBTQ focus to business ownership, we must remember that not being LGBTQ-identified doesn’t mean what it did 25 years ago. Today in our informal meetings with new owners and managers, they chose the Castro, despite not being LGBTQ, because of its diversity and makeup. They can’t think of a more diverse and exciting place to locate.”

The two stated there’s work to be done to make the Castro more inclusive for those who aren’t white, cis gay men like themselves.

“There’s always a lot of talk the circumstances of the request before reactivating.”

Neither Natali nor Bruce returned Hoodline’s requests for comment last week.

Badlands, which had been open since 1974 and was a nightclub under Natali’s ownership since 1999, closed three years ago, as the B.A.R. previously reported. A Facebook post at the time stated, “Later this fall a new bar, under new ownership, will open in the Badlands location.”

That didn’t happen, but Bruce told the B.A.R. the following year that the space was being renovated.

“Basically the space is just being remodeled. It should be open by the end of the year or early, maybe, shortly after the year ends,” Bruce told the B.A.R. in summer 2021.

“That’s basically all there is to say at the moment.”

Natali told the B.A.R. earlier this month that renovations on the Badlands space are “pretty close to being done right now.” Natali said that Bruce is “going to buy it. He’s [Bruce] going to take over. His attorney and my attorney are going to work it out. He’s going to be the boss and have all the control.” When asked if that means Bruce will own the property at 4121 18th Street, Natali was not clear.

“I don’t want to get into detail about this,” Natali said. “We’ve been negotiating [for] some time and it’s between his attorney and my attorney and this is what we’re working out – that he’s going to be in charge.

People want to know who’s going to be running the place and it looks like it’s going to be TJ.”

Natali also told the B.A.R. that Bruce would be in charge of renaming the establishment. When asked what he’d name it, Bruce stated, “if it is up to me, it will always be Badlands.”

Controversial past Badlands and Natali had been under renewed criticism in the months prior to the announcement of its 2020 closure due to allegations of racial discrimination that surfaced in the 2000s.

A 2004 report by the San Francisco Human Rights Commission found that Badlands was discriminating against African Americans, but the findings were never official because Virginia Harmon, the HRC executive director at the time, did not sign off on the staff report. Natali and the complainants eventually reached a confidential settlement. Natali has always denied the accusations.

Natali later opened Toad Hall on the site of what had been the Pendulum, a bar that catered to Black LGBTQs.

In an email to the B.A.R. after this was brought up at a June 2020 Black Lives Matter protest held in the Castro’s Jane Warner Plaza, Natali wrote that the allegations “were found without merit and were dropped.”

“We welcome people of all races and all colors and we probably have the largest, most diverse clientele of any bar in the Castro,” he stated at the time. t and people of color. “We have a lot of work to do, and this report will help with that.”

Survey details

A summary of survey results found that “although businesses were less likely to be owned or managed by queer people, LGBTQ people were employed in most businesses,” with 72% of the participating businesses reporting they had LGBTQ employees.

“Racial diversity was high amongst the businesses in the district with a majority having employed people of color, many of whom were also queer,” the summary continued. “A little over half of businesses employed queer women.”

AIDS Memorial Quilt & Gilead

about how the Castro is changing, or is not welcoming to certain groups, but it’s encouraging that the data show a fair amount of diversity,” Allen and Beswick added. “We want the Castro to be welcoming to LGBTQ folks, BIPOC folks, women and allies especially, and there’s no better way to do that than to have businesses owned or managed by these groups, and employing diverse workers,” they stated, referring to Black, Indigenous,

Eighty-six percent of the businesses had at least one person of color employed, the summary stated, and 53% employed queer women. However, the percent owned or managed by an LGBTQ person was 45%.

The survey did not include 70 businesses within the district’s boundaries, as they were “unavailable or uninterested in the interview,” according to the report.

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