UPDATE: The City of Buffalo tells 7 News it has temporarily paused the collection of amusement license fees. You can read more here.
ORIGINAL: If you know the Buffalo music scene, then you know you can find a performance happening just about every night.
Sportsmens Tavern owner Dwane Hall says they have 15 shows a week.
"We're all over the board. People from all over the world come here. We do everything from bluegrass to jazz and everything in between," Hall said. "We do between this place and our outside venue and the Cave which is our sister bar. We're doing almost 900 shows a year."
After 40 years in business, Hall says he just found out about the city's 'amusement fee' which charges business owners each time they host ticketed shows.
"And it doesn't make a difference if it's music, if it's theatrical, if it's magic show," Hall said. "From what I understand, Shea's has been paying it for years. It's been on the books for years. But for the rest of us, we've never heard about it before."
The Investigative Post first reported this and obtained a letter that Hall and other business owners received telling them this "fee" that's been established will be enforced even though most places had never even heard of it. If it's not paid, the letter states businesses could be fined.
"I'm not against paying anything if it makes sense, but to add $45,000 to $50,000 on our budget, to a place where we're not getting rich. We're not in the money business," Hall said.
Bill Casale, general manager of Buffalo Riverworks, told 7 News senior reporter Michael Wooten that this is the first time he's heard of this fee and it could be costly.
"It could have over a $100,000 impact on Riverworks alone," Casale said. "It's gonna be overwhelming for this industry. I don't know if we could overcome it without passing on expenses to the customer. We're all sick of inflation. We're all tired of dealing with more costs."
But a few miles uptown, Venu's event manager Tim Walton says he's been paying this fee for years.
"We send in the permits, we pay the fees and then we do the events. You know, it's kind of just like dotting your I's, crossing your T's and stuff that we do every month," Walton said. "It adds up."
Now these business owners want answers.
"It's just got to be fair across the board," Walton said.
"We pay a lot of licensing fees already, so we're hoping that this will go by the wayside," Hall said.
