WHATELY — Following several check-ins, the Select Board has opted to loosen Club Castaway’s police detail requirements to just Friday and Saturday nights.

When the club reopened in October, the board opted to require a police detail each Thursday, Friday and Saturday night, as its owners had only operated the business for a few months in late 2019 and early 2020 before closing amid the pandemic. That being the case, the Selectboard wanted to ensure the business was running responsibly.

With several months of operation in the rearview, as well as positive reports from Police Chief James Sevigne Jr., the board opted to amend the alcohol and adult entertainment licenses to only require a police detail on weekends, which the club’s owners said would show the town has trust in them to run their business.

“(Town Administrator Brian Domina) received a note from the police chief detailing the couple of incidents that they had been alerted to, which seem, to my mind, rather minor incidents that could have happened at any bar,” said Select Board Chair Fred Baron. “My position is I would go with the modification. … If the chief says he’s OK with it, I see no reason to micromanage.”

While Club Castaway co-owners Nick Spagnola and Julius Sokol were unable to attend Tuesday’s Select Board meeting, they thanked the board for working with them and said they will “not be making any additional requests to end the weekend detail for the foreseeable future.”

“We will continue to work with the Select Board by providing updates on our operations and transparency as to any incidents we need to make them aware of,” Spagnola said in a text on Wednesday, adding that they will “certainly” request additional police detail for any special events they hold. “Club Castaway management and I remain focused on making this place the very best for adult entertainment and providing a safe and exciting atmosphere for patrons and dancers to enjoy.”

When the club’s current owners took over in 2019, the Select Board granted a variance to the alcohol and adult entertainment license and required a police detail on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights from 9:30 p.m. to 1:30 a.m. over a four-month “probationary period.” However, the club closed in 2020 with about six weeks left in that probationary period and remained shuttered throughout the pandemic.

In October, the club finally reopened and the Select Board opted to keep its police detail requirements in effect at least through a 45-day period to evaluate how the club was handling public safety measures by talking to the owners and Sevigne at Select Board meetings. In subsequent meetings, the board extended the detail requirements through Feb. 4.

At those meetings, Sevigne said police reports have been limited and anytime something has come up, the club handled it in the correct way, a sentiment that Selectboard member Joyce Palmer-Fortune echoed Tuesday night.

“They handled it the way they told us they would handle it, so there’s a track record there,” Palmer-Fortune said. “The way he described their response, I was very heartened by that. That’s important to me.”

Chris Larabee can be reached at clarabee@recorder.com.