Kansas City News Blog

​I was waiting for a friend outside the gated-off streets of Westport on a Saturday night this past summer when I saw two girls walk up to a Westport security guard and hand over their I.D.s.

"Sorry, you gotta be American to get in here!" jeered one guard, handing the IDs back. The girls turned and left wordlessly. I caught a glimpse of one of the I.D.s in the girls' hands. It was a Mexican I.D.

Hoping that scene was an isolated incident, I dismissed it until the other day, when Sergio Chavez told me that he's been hearing complaints all summer from Latino friends who've been turned away from the gay bars they used to frequent.

Chavez is well-known in the gay and Latino communities in Kansas City. He hosts a Latin drag show at Bar Azul in Kansas City, Kansas, on Saturday nights, and he says after closing Azul one recent night, he and some friends -- all over 21 -- headed to another regular hangout, Missie B's on 39th Street, which is open until 3 a.m. That night, the security at the door turned away  anyone with a Mexican I.D. -- even identification issued from the office of the Mexican Consulate on 1600 Baltimore in Kansas City.

"My friends were embarrassed," Chavez says. "I don't want them to feel different. They already feel different enough."

He's particularly frustrated, given the support he's shown the gay community in Kansas City.

"I participate in the AIDS Walk, in the Pride Festival downtown," Chavez says. "I don't want to see my people treated like this." 

So what's with the sudden rejection of Mexican identification at bars? After all, a bar owner's only responsibility is to keep unaccompanied minors out, which has nothing to do with a customer's nationality.

Gary Majors, from the city's Department of Regulated Industries, says he's issued no specific warnings about foreign identification. He figures that bar owners are particularly cautious these days, though, because his department has been running a lot of stings lately.

"We've been hitting the minor stuff hard," Majors tells The Pitch. "We only did 10 or 12 checks last year, and this year we've done 275. There were 12 places that I suspended (from selling alcohol) at various times in August for selling to minors. I'd be careful if I was a bar owner as well."

It doesn't matter to Majors how a bartender or bouncer determines whether a patron is old enough to drink, Majors says. Hypothetically, "if Westport's security wanted to do DNA tests, fine ... but I will hold them responsible for it if there is someone under 21 drinking there. So most places will say they'd rather be safe than sorry and want to make sure customers are using Kansas or Missouri identification, because those are the ones they're most familiar with."

So a Mexican I.D. could be considered valid proof of age, Majors says, as long as the bartender or bouncer can be reasonably certain that the I.D. is real and the patron is over 21; however, if the patron looks young, it might be wise to turn them away.

But it seems that some bar owners and managers have been hearing conflicting information. Jan Allen, the manager of Missie B's, says that as she understands the law, only four types of identification are valid: military I.D.s, state I.D.s, state driver's licenses or passports. A sign on the bar's door specifies that these are all they'll accept. "It burns me up to turn away business," Allen says, "especially people who have been coming here regularly. Now I have to, and all I can do is take a few minutes to tell people to try to get a state I.D."

John Koop of Flo's Cabaret at 1911 Main Street used to host a Latino Night on Thursdays, starting in April. That ended in July, after someone from liquor control told Koop to stop accepting Mexican identification. "You can tell if someone's 30, for God's sake, and if they have a Mexican I.D., yeah, we want them to come in," Koop says. "They were great tippers; they were fun. I love the music. I would love to have a Latino night again. But when I called (Regulated Industries), they said Mexican I.D.s are not legal I.D.s, so we stopped ... because 90 percent of the customers had those I.D.s." 

Majors says he's never sent anyone into a bar or restaurant with a Mexican I.D. in a sting operation. Businesses are disciplined after stings in which Majors sends underage kids into businesses to buy liquor. "My kids don't lie," Majors says. "At one location, we visited for the third time, and a clerk asked the kid, 'You're not 21, are you?' (He answered), 'No, I'm 20.' The clerk said, 'Must be great to be that young,' and sold him the alcohol. It was their third offense. What am I supposed to do?" In that situation, Majors says, the owner was given a choice: Shut down for six days or not serve alcohol for 15 days.

Reading the state statutes, it's easy to see how a bar owner could be confused. They also have reason to be paranoid, given that there are three different agencies waiting to catch any mistakes: the Kansas City Police Department's Vice Squad, the city's Regulated Industries Department and the state's Kansas City Division of Alcohol and Tobacco Control.

Walking by Tootsies on Main earlier this week, I stopped to chat with a manager and the bar's head of security. They told me that they still accept Mexican I.D. from patrons who are over 21. The crime, they say, is serving anyone underage. As long as they are confident their patrons are old enough to drink, they're welcome regardless of where their I.D. is from, they told me.

Until other bars in Kansas City can get a straight story from their regulators, it sounds like Tootsie's is the place to be with Mexican I.D.

As for the scene I witnessed in Westport, my message for Lieutenant Dominic Pena, director of public safety, was not returned.