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1. "Public dance hall." Any room, place or space in the city in which dancing is carried on and to which the public may gain admission, either with or without the payment of a fee.

2. "Public dance or ball." Any dance or ball of any nature or description to which the public may gain admission.

3. "Cabaret." Any room, place or space in the city in which any musical entertainment, singing, dancing or other form of amusement is permitted in connection with the restaurant business or the business of directly or indirectly selling to the public food or drink, except eating or drinking places, which provide incidental musical entertainment, without dancing, either by mechanical devices, or by not more than three persons. [In other words, anywhere in the city where food or drink is sold, and you have more than 3 people dancing.]

4. "Catering establishment." Any room, place or space in the city, which is used, leased or hired out in the business of serving food or beverages for a particular function, occasion or event, to which the public is not invited or admitted and wherein music or entertainment is permitted.

5. "Person." An individual, corporation, club, partnership, association, society or any other organized group of persons, and shall include officers, directors and trustees of a corporation, club, association or society.

6. "Employee." A person employed in any capacity or title in connection with a cabaret or public dance hall, including the licensee and any and all persons responsible for the control or management thereof. It shall also include a concessionaire and each person employed by such concessionaire.

7. "Security guard." A person as defined by subdivision six of section eighty-nine-f of the general business law. There shall be a rebuttable presumption that a person employed or whose services are retained at a public dance hall or cabaret whose job functions include (1) the monitoring or guarding of the entrance or exit of such public dance hall or cabaret to manage ingress and egress to such public dance hall or cabaret for security purposes during the hours of operation of such establishment and/or (2) protection of such public dance hall or cabaret from disorderly or other unlawful conduct by such patrons is a security guard, provided, however, that such rebuttable presumption shall not apply to the owner of the public dance hall or cabaret.

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§ 20-360 Licenses and fingerprinting.

a. It shall be unlawful for any person to conduct, maintain or operate, or engage in the business of conducting, maintaining or operating, a public dance hall, cabaret or catering establishment unless the premises wherein the same is conducted, maintained or operated are licensed in the manner prescribed herein. [ie, If you intend to run a place where people dance, you must be licensed.]

b. A membership corporation, club, association or society which permits musical entertainment, singing, dancing or other form of amusement in premises wherein food or drink is directly or indirectly sold to its members, or their guests, or to the public, shall be deemed to be conducting a cabaret hereunder.

c. A steamship or boat moored or tied to a dock, pier or shore, and which contains a dance hall or cabaret in use while so moored or tied, shall be required to obtain such license.

d. All applicants for licenses required by the provisions of this subchapter and holders of concessions on premises requiring such license shall be fingerprinted. If the applicant is a partnership, all members of the partnership shall be fingerprinted. Except in the discretion of the commissioner, if the applicant is a corporation, club, association, society or other organized groups of persons, all officers, directors, stockholders and other persons entitled to a share of the income or profits shall be fingerprinted. If the applicant for a cabaret license is the proprietor of a hotel containing more than two hundred rooms, only an officer or manager of the hotel filing the application shall be fingerprinted.

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§ 20-360.1 Security guards in public dance halls or cabarets.

a. It shall be a violation of this subchapter for any person to conduct, maintain or operate a public dance hall or cabaret that employs or retains the services of one or more security guards without complying with the provisions of article 7-A of the general business law.

b. A public dance hall or cabaret that employs or retains the services of one or more security guards shall maintain and make available during all hours of operation, in accordance with rules promulgated by the department, proof that each such security guard is validly registered pursuant to article 7-A of the general business law.

c. A public dance hall or cabaret shall maintain a roster of all security guards working at any given time when such public dance hall or cabaret is open to the public, and shall require each security guard to maintain on his or her person proof of registration at all times when on the premises.

d. The enforcement agency shall report any violation of the provisions of this section to the state liquor authority if the licensee holds a license pursuant to the alcoholic beverage control law.

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§ 20-361 Issuance and renewal of license.

a. The commissioner may refuse to issue or renew a license to an applicant only upon the occurrence of any one or more of the following conditions:

1. the applicant, licensee, its officers, principals, directors and stockholders owning more than ten percent of the outstanding stock of the corporation have not submitted complete and accurate information required by the department in connection with:

(a) an application for a license or renewal thereof;

(b) an application for the approval of a change of ownership;

(c) the furnishing of a record of convictions for offenses as provided in paragraph five of this subdivision;

(d) the furnishing of financial information and records by the applicant, licensee, its officers, principals, directors and stockholders owning more than ten percent of the outstanding stock of the corporation concerning the source of funds used or intended to be used in the operation of the licensed business and the amount of total funds each such individual has invested in the business;

2. the premises on or in which the licensed business is to be conducted have not been certified as in compliance with the health, fire, buildings, zoning and water, gas and electricity safety requirements and standards established by the laws of the city and state of New York or any other governmental authority having jurisdiction thereof; [The fee for a license is negligible when compared to the costs of meeting the requirements in this part.]

3. with respect to a new license application for the premises on or in which the licensed business is to be conducted, there is no current certificate of occupancy to operate a public dance hall, cabaret or catering establishment;

4. the applicant, licensee, its officers, principals, directors and stockholders have not complied with the regulations of the department applicable thereto;

5. the applicant, licensee, its officers, principals, directors and stockholders owning more than ten percent of the outstanding stock of the corporation have been convicted of:

(a) any of the following offenses and there is a relationship between the offense and the conduct of a public dance hall, cabaret or catering establishment:

(i) an offense within article two hundred of the penal law relating to bribery involving public servants;

(ii) a felony within article two hundred ten of the penal law relating to perjury;

(iii) an offense within article two hundred thirty of the penal law relating to prostitution offenses;

(iv) an offense within article two hundred forty-five of the penal law relating to offenses against public sensibilities;

(v) an offense within section 260.20 of the penal law relating to unlawfully dealing with a child;

(b) any other offense which is a felony under the laws of this state or a crime committed in violation of the laws of any other jurisdiction which if committed in this state would be a felony;

(c) any offense which is a misdemeanor involving the premises on or in which the licensed business is to be conducted.

6. the applicant, licensee, its officers, principals, directors and stockholders owning more than ten percent of the outstanding stock of the corporation have suffered or permitted the premises on or in which the licensed business is to be conducted, through improper or inadequate maintenance and supervision, to be used for the commission of any of the offenses set forth in paragraph five of this subdivision;

7. the applicant, its officers, principals, directors, stockholders owning more than ten percent of the outstanding stock of the corporation and employees thereof at the premises on which the licensed business is to be conducted have at least three times been proven to be in violation of the provisions of subchapter one of chapter five of this title of this code or of any regulations promulgated thereunder.

(b) The commissioner shall not issue or renew a license if the applicant, licensee, its officers, principals, directors and stockholders owning more than ten percent of the outstanding stock of the corporation have not paid, within the time permitted by law, any fine, penalty or judgment duly imposed in connection with or arising from the use, occupation or operation of the premises on which the licensed business is to be conducted.

[ parts c and d are omitted from the NYS leginfo online text ]

(e) Each applicant and licensee shall notify the department in writing by registered mail, return receipt requested, within three business days of receipt of notice of service of a summons for a violation relating to the operation of the business licensed or to be licensed or to the premises on or in which the business licensed or to be licensed is to be conducted and of a conviction for any offense set forth in paragraph five of subdivision a of this section occurring after the filing date of the application for a license or a renewal thereof or occurring during the term of the license.

(f) In the manner prescribed in rule three hundred eighteen of the civil practice law and rules, each applicant or licensee shall designate an agent, a substitute agent and a successor agent for receiving service of process and communications from this department located within the city of New York. Proof of such designation shall be filed with the license application at the department.

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§ 20-362 Exemptions. This subchapter shall not apply to:

a. Premises owned, occupied and used exclusively by a membership corporation, club, society or association, provided such membership corporation, club, society or association was in actual existence prior to January first, nineteen hundred twenty-six. [If you opened your club before 1926, you're in the clear. Centenarians, rejoice.]

b. Premises owned, occupied and used exclusively by a religious, charitable, eleemosynary or educational corporation or institution. [Church and school dances are not a problem. "Eleemosyany," in case you were wondering, means "supported by a charity."]

c. Premises licensed pursuant to subchapters one and three of this chapter. [Subchapter one addresses " Retail Cigarette Dealers;" subchapter three "Amusement Devices, Arcades, and Operators." Apparently it's okay to dance while The Winston Man or Pac Man chaperones.]

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§ 20-363 Fees. [Again, the fees here are nominal. It's compliance with § 20-361 part a-2 that makes a cabaret license costly.]

a. The license herein prescribed shall be issued by the commissioner. Application for such license shall be made on a form containing such information as may be determined by the commissioner, and shall be certified to by the applicant.

The fee for each cabaret or public dance hall license shall be as follows:

Capacity	Fee
Up to and including 74 persons	$300
75 to 299 persons	400
300 to 599 persons	455
600 or more persons	500 for each year or fraction thereof.

The fee for each catering establishment shall be as follows:

Capacity	Fee
Up to and including 74 persons	$200
75 to 299 persons	275
300 to 599 persons	400
600 or more persons	535 for each year or fraction thereof.

b. If additional rooms are to be used independently by the same applicant in the same premises as a public dance hall, cabaret or catering establishment, the applicant shall indicate on the application the location of each and every room or space which is to be used for such purpose. In such cases a separate license shall be required for each such additional independent room or space, and the fee for each such independent additional room or space shall be sixty dollars.

c. A partial fee in an amount equal to one-third of the applicable license fee shall be paid upon filing of an application for a license herein prescribed, in order to defray the cost of processing the application and shall not be refundable. The processing fee shall be applied against the fee to be paid for the issuance of such license as provided herein.

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§ 20-364 Posting of license.

Each license issued hereunder shall be kept posted at the main entrance of every place licensed hereunder. [Try finding one of these next time you're dancing.]

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§ 20-365 License not transferable.

No license issued under the provisions of this subchapter shall be transferred or assigned to any person, or used by any person other than the licensee to whom it was issued, nor shall such license be used on any location other than the location stated in such license. [You can't take it with you when you go. If a space changes hands, or a party moves elsewhere, you must obtain a new license.]

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§ 20-366 Changes in corporate licenses.

If, during the term of the licensing period, one or more directors, stockholders or officers of a corporate license, is substituted or added, such substituted or added directors, stockholders or officers shall, within five days of such substitution or addition, file with the commissioner an application for an approval of the change of directors, stockholders or officers on such forms as are prescribed by the commissioner. A waiver of this provision may be granted in the discretion of the commissioner to any corporation with regard to stockholders holding less than ten percent of the issued stock.

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§ 20-367 Places closed to public within certain hours.

Premises licensed hereunder shall not be kept open for business, nor shall the public be permitted to enter or to remain therein, between four ante meridian and eight ante meridian; and if the occupant is a membership corporation, club, association, or society, its members or their guests shall not be permitted to enter or to remain therein between such hours. The commissioner, in his or her discretion, may permit any premises licensed hereunder to be open to the public between such hours on special occasions. If it appears to the commissioner that the place for which a license is sought will be frequented by minors, or if there is in the opinion of the commissioner any other good and sufficient reason therefor, he or she may grant a license upon the condition that the licensed premises shall not be open for business between one ante meridian and eight ante meridian. [No dancing whatsoever between 4am-8am!]

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§ 20-368 Rules and regulations.

The commissioner is authorized to adopt such reasonable rules and regulations as he or she may deem necessary for the proper control, operation, and supervision of public dance halls, cabarets and catering establishments.

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§ 20-369 Suspension and revocation of license.

a. The commissioner may suspend or revoke a license for conduct of the licensee, its officers, principals, directors, agents or employees or in a closely held corporation, stockholders that would constitute grounds for denying the issuance of renewal of a license pursuant to section 20-361 of this code.

(b) Upon application to the commissioner and prior to the reinstatement or reissuance of a suspended or revoked license, the licensee, with the commissioner's approval, shall, upon payment of the fee as specified in section 20-362 of this code, be permitted to operate for six months on a probationary license. At the end of such six month period, the license shall be reinstated or reissued unless the commissioner finds that the licensee, its officers, principals, directors, agents or employees or, in a closely held corporation, stockholders, have engaged in conduct that would constitute grounds for denying the issuance or renewal of a license pursuant to section 20-361 of this code. Upon a finding of such conduct the probationary license shall be revoked and shall not be reissued for a period of one year.

b. The commissioner may suspend or revoke a cabaret or public dance hall license if the licensee violates the requirements of section 20-360.1 of this subchapter, provided, however, that the commissioner shall suspend or revoke a cabaret or public dance hall license upon the third violation by the licensee within two years of the first violation.

c. Upon application to the commissioner and prior to the reinstatement or reissuance of a suspended or revoked license, the licensee, with the commissioner's approval, shall, upon payment of the fee as specified in section 20-362 of this code, be permitted to operate for six months on a probationary license. At the end of such six month period, the license shall be reinstated or reissued unless the commissioner finds that the licensee, its officers, principals, directors, agents or employees or, in a closely held corporation, stockholders, have engaged in conduct that would constitute grounds for denying the issuance or renewal of a license pursuant to section 20-361 of this code. Upon a finding of such conduct the probationary license shall be revoked and shall not be reissued for a period of one year.

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The Text of the NYC Cabaret Laws