Ellington

The Jackson Police Department is restarting an initiative aimed at preventing crime around the city's hotels and motels and protecting visitors. Called Tourism Oriented Policing Strategies, or TOPS, the program emphasizes building relationships between police and city businesses.

"It's quite similar to our community-oriented policing," said JPD Deputy Chief for Patrol Eric Wall. "We just try to educate the folks at these establishments, their employees, as to what to do to keep their visitors safe when they come into Jackson."

JPD and the Jackson Convention and Visitors Bureau adopted the program in 2006, when Jackson was one of 12 cities participating. JPD is "re-energizing" the program under Chief Rebecca Coleman, Wall said.

Under the program, JPD will assign beat officers to teach crime prevention strategies at every hotel and motel in the city, giving hotel managers and employees a personal contact with the department.

Restaurants

Two Jackson restaurants recently acquired liquor licenses. Farish Street blues club and restaurant F. Jones Corner earned its license two weeks ago. Because of Farish Street's resort status designation, F. Jones can serve liquor 24 hours a day, every day of the week, owner Daniel Dillon said.

The three-month application process for the license was "arduous" and "meticulous," owner Daniel Dillon said, including background checks for all owners and stakeholders, and payment of a $5,000 bond and a $1,000 annual fee.

Dillon said that F. Jones will take advantage of the liquor license during a series of outdoor daytime events this summer. The blues club is also increasing its regular door charge after midnight from $5 to $10.

"The obvious thing is to get people here earlier, and the not-so-obvious thing is to make it a more enjoyable experience for the people who do pay to come in," Dillon said.

Russian-American restaurant Olga's Fine Dining also acquired a liquor license two weeks ago, owner Olga Abramovich said. The license complements a new lounge room at the restaurant.

"We have a service bar, but I like to have a lounge because it's more quiet," Abramovich said. "It's a separate room where you can sit down and enjoy yourself. When you're so busy all day, you just want to come and relax."

Olga's also celebrated the two-year anniversary of its move to Jackson on May 1. Before its current location on the I-55 Frontage Road north of Highland Village, Olga's spent four and a half years in Flowood.

More

On Friday, the Jackson Redevelopment Authority voted to approve the sale of property to the Jackson-based LEAD Group for the construction of a Sleep Inn on Pearl and Gallatin streets. JRA temporarily purchased the property from the LEAD Group in February after the investment firm had to find new construction financing. Attorney Robert Gibbs, a LEAD Group member, told the Jackson Free Press last week that the firm had secured new financing.