Elderly residents who paid up to $1m to live in seniors dorm at ASU file lawsuit about party NOISE

Older residents who paid up to $1 million to live in a senior dormitory on the Arizona State University campus have filed a lawsuit over noise from student partying.

Residents of Mirabella — a dormitory complex for people age 62 and older — filed a lawsuit in Maricopa County Superior Court last spring over the “unnecessary and excessive noise” from students at the Shady Park bar.

Located across the street from Mirabella, Shady Park has been a solid venue for outdoor EDM concerts since 2015 in a city home to the University of Playboy Magazine that was once named the best party school in the country.

A judge ruled in Mirabella’s favor last spring, ordering Shady Park to limit the volume of outside noise, and imposing a 11 p.m. curfew at the venue Friday and Saturday nights.

While the residents of Mirabella might have celebrated with a quiet nap, Shady Park announced that the injunction would completely eliminate the ability to provide live music, and could even lead to bankruptcy.

The bar appealed shortly after, and last month the City of Tempe filed documents in support of Shady Park, stating that the judge made his ruling on the basis that downtown Tempe was a residential area, when in fact it was a neighborhood. for mixed use.

A recent ASU alumna, 25-year-old Anna Bartholomew, offered: The Wall Street Journal a more blunt take on things: ‘There will be parties. There will be a lot of noise. It’s ASU.’

Mirabella opened in 2020, in the midst of the pandemic, when bars like Shady Park closed and sat silent on the streets of Tempe.

The dorm serves as a full-service retirement center, and the seven-figure prepayment is not used to purchase units, but serves as a down payment for the medical care residents receive as long as they live in Mirabella.

Residents also pay about $5,000 a month to cover food, cleaning, and other building utilities.

The seniors also have access to ASU facilities and can enroll in and participate in university classes.

However, when the pandemic ended — and the boom of Shady Park’s EDM concerts returned to serve the partying ASU students — Mirabella residents, who were used to peace and quiet, began to complain.

“That relentless thumping bass makes it hard to concentrate or do anything else,” resident Sharon Murry said in the lawsuit against Shady Park.

Another resident, Gail Fisher, said she knew there was live music across the street, but had never considered its true scope.

“Live music can mean a trio,” she explained in her statement, “It doesn’t mean boom-boom-boom all night.”

“It seems like they turn up the volume of the music later in the evening, so it often wakes me up,” plaintiff Edward Kavazanjian said in his statement.

Mirabella’s executive director, Tom Dorough, told The Wall Street Journal that the dorm tried to negotiate with the bar but was forced to file a lawsuit because no solution could be reached.

“We want to be neighbors, we want to coexist, and we just couldn’t get them there,” Dorough said. “So they really left us no choice but to sue.”

In her lawsuit, Mirabella asked the county to prevent Shady Park from “producing noise that exceeds the Tempe community standard.”

After the judge ruled in favor of the lawsuit, Shady Park owner Scott Price expressed his dismay.

“This is just devastating news,” Price said USA today. ‘We strongly disagree with the findings and will immediately appeal.’

“If this bad decision is upheld, Shady Park will be forced to close its doors to so many of our friends, family and associates,” he added. “This is because the income from shows is essential to our ability to pay for the rest of the business.”

Mirabella released a statement saying residents were happy with the ruling.

“This ruling brings relief to the residents of Mirabella and the surrounding community who have been harmed by the excessive noise of Shady Park,” the dorm said, calling residents “an important part of the vibrant and growing community in downtown Tempe and they appreciate her culture and energy, but just want to enjoy their community without undue disruption.’

Shady Park’s appeal remains pending, and last month the City of Tempe expressed support for the bar’s motion.

“We had a duty to intervene and say no, we are the elected body that runs this city, and our ordinances are ours to decide,” said City Councilman Randy Keating, according to KPHO Phoenix.

In its support for Shady Park, the city argued that the order will prevent “decades” of efforts to turn downtown Tempe into a vibrant neighborhood.

‘[Tempe] For decades, we’ve been trying to lift the city center out of decay and nurture a mixed-use community where people can live, play, dine, enjoy entertainment and work,” read the city’s amicus briefly.

‘[The injunction] threatens the continuation and success of these efforts by determining the likelihood of proving that a club’s music is a nuisance based on the city center’s misclassification as residential and ‘non-music’ commercial.”

Keating added that until Mirabella came along, Shady Park was never considered a problematic member of the community.

“Shady Park has always functioned within the legal boundaries of the City of Tempe, so ultimately I would like to see a solution that all parties can agree on and are happy with.

Representatives from Mirabella and from ASU did not respond to the request for comment at the time of publication.