Several West Beach residents showed up at Gulf Shores city hall for Monday’s council meeting to express their concern over late night noise along the beach.

Most of the concerns were over music coming from The Hangout and Mudbugs, two popular Gulf Coast establishments known for their live music.

“As a direct result of our town hall meetings, we have received a lot of phone calls from people in the community,” said resident Tom Moore. “Usually we will send an email to the council or department heads to share those concerns. We have been getting a lot of calls about noise, so we told the people not to tell us, but to come to the council meetings.”

Indeed, that is what they did.

Several residents who live in the West Beach area approached the microphone to tell the council about loud music playing into the early morning hours on almost a daily basis.

“Starting March 8, The Hangout started playing music until two o’clock in the morning,” said resident Bill Hanks, who lives on West Fifth Avenue. “We’ve got school kids in the neighborhood and they are playing music this late during the week.”

Hanks said even though the police had been called on several occasions, it appeared very little was being done to solve the issue.

“I’ve got to believe that y’all want people like us here that love Gulf Shores and want to have a peaceful town. I don’t want to see this town wind up being like Panama City,” Hanks said. “I’m not against The Hangout, and I’m all for every business here doing good, but there is a time to sleep.”

Mayor Robert Craft confirmed he had received several emails concerning the noise issue and said that he has been working on the problem with police chief Edward Delmore.

“We are trying to reach a compromise where the interests of the residents are considered as well as the interests of the business owners,” Delmore said.

Delmore said he has met with the city attorney to see if the present ordinance is appropriate and constitutionally sound.

“We are trying to establish geographic limits as well as time limits as far as how long into the evening the music can be played.”

According to Delmore, the current ordinance is not specific in regards to how late music can be played at an establishment.

“We have recorded all of the complaints and we hope to have a resolution that will be both acceptable to the residents and to the business community within the next couple of days.”

Mayor Craft reiterated Delmore’s comments.

“We don’t have an answer yet, but we are working on it and it is out goal within the next couple of days to have a new plan in place that will be enforced this week,” Craft said.