February 2, 1988 Building and fire inspectors for the town of Smithtown, who last month shut down an exotic-dance lounge in Nesconset after citing its owner for more than 100 safety violations, now are attempting to shut off electrical power to the building. Angelo Capazzoli, the town’s chief building official, said that the owner of the Centerfold Lounge at 769 Nesconset Hwy. was making repairs to the building without having the required building permits. Building inspectors who returned to the lounge after it was shut down could hear men working inside, but got no response when they pounded on the door, he said.
“I know they’re doing work in there without permits, so I requested the lighting company turn off the electricity,” Capazzoli said.
He recently asked Long Island Lighting Co. to discontinue service to the building until the lounge’s owner obtained permits for interior renovations and an underwriters’ certificate for electrical repairs. The letter was co-signed by two town fire marshals.
“What I’m saying to . . . {the lounge owner} is, give me a drawing of what they’re going to do and I’ll issue them a permit for it,” Capazzoli said. “This way . . . they’ll be required to have it inspected, and they can supply me with an electric underwriters’ certificate.”
He said yesterday that LILCO officials told him that a registered letter would be sent to Centerfold owner Peter Sofia telling him to obtain an underwriters’ certificate for electrical work within 10 days or face discontinuance of service. LILCO officials said they could not just turn off power to the lounge because Sofia had paid his bills and had not tampered with their equipment.
The Centerfold Lounge was cited for blocked fire exits, exposed and uncapped wiring, undersized doorways, drop ceilings made of wood instead of fireproof material, exposed plumbing, overflowing dumpsters, and broken-down vehicles on the property. John Valentine, head of the town’s Code Enforcement Bureau, said the inspections by town fire-safety and building inspectors and Suffolk police, who accompanied the inspectors, were part of a crackdown on places of public assembly.
Sofia has claimed that the town was harrassing him to get him to close. His attorney could not be reached for comment yesterday.
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