“‘With the Disney-fication of Sixth Street, we’ve had live [original] music venues get outpriced and move onto Red River,’ says Wickham. ‘And the bars that are on Red River right now, we’ve survived the economic downturns that have happened over the last three or four years. We’ve survived poor city planning that put a homeless shelter right across the street from my bar. And yet this smoking ordinance threatens me in a way that poor city planning and economic downturns never could. That’s the concern.
‘This is something real, and quite frankly, all the live music venues and all of the bands I’ve talked to, we’re scared. There are no two ways about it. I’m not going to lie and say we think we can beat this thing. We’re scared. We’re really scared. This is going to change not only our business but what Austin is to everybody who comes here, and the only thing we can do about it is try to better inform people right now.’”
