LEWISTON – Scott Verreault thinks his new martini bar might be the kind of drinking establishment the city wants to see downtown.

The new bar, 351, offers food and more expensive drinks. He built it out of his existing night club, the Gallery Theatre Bar at 347 Lisbon St., and said he plans to slowly replace the night club with the martini bar.

Tuesday night, Verreault wanted to know if he was on the right track.

“I’ve put an awful lot of money into it,” Verreault said. “I just want to know; does the city just look at me like another social club?”

Verreault didn’t get solid answers from councilors Tuesday, but the city did begin creating new regulations for downtown drinking establishments.

Councilors voted to create four kinds of special amusement permits for bars that offer some kind of entertainment. City Administrator Jim Bennett said the next step would be up to the Planning Board, which would draft regulations for those permits.

“This is a multiple part process,” Bennett said. “We can’t really do it all in one step. We need to create the different permits before we can start regulating what happens to them.”

The city put a moratorium on new bars downtown in November while they looked for ways to bring some class to the area. The Centreville area – which includes the Bates Mill and the Southern Gateway on Lisbon Street – has been the city’s economic development focus lately. Oxford Networks, Andover College and VIP Auto Discount Center have all started building on Lisbon Street.

Councilors are hoping to attract classier drinking establishments more in keeping with an upscale downtown.

Councilors began by creating classes of businesses that sell alcohol and provide entertainment. The four classes would be restaurants, bars or lounges, restaurants and bars that offer dancing, and function halls.

Restaurants and function halls that play live music or offer other kinds of entertainment would be encouraged. Bars, night clubs and restaurants that have dancing could be restricted by the Planning Board.

“Right now, the regulations say that bars cannot be closer to each other than 500 feet,” Bennett said. “We might change that to allow restaurants next to each other. But dance clubs, we might limit those to 500 feet.”

Councilor Mark Paradis said he was disappointed by the plan. He expected to see more definite regulations.

“There’s nothing here that has any teeth,” Paradis said. “There’s nothing here that tells us what is expected. And there’s nothing that tells the bars what’s expected.”

Bennett said that discussion would come later, as far as the special amusement permits were concerned. Actual liquor violations might be better left up to the police, who have promised to step up efforts to meet with bar owners.

“That may be something better left up to the discretion of the police,” Bennett said.

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