Shutting down somebody’s business is not a decision any public agency should take lightly. Absent a compelling public interest, government’s main duty toward the private sector is to stay out of the way.

But Coos Bay’s police chief makes a good case for pulling the plug on Mak’s Old City Hall Lounge.

The Oregon Liquor Control Commission last summer charged the bar with having a history of serious, persistent problems. The citation should have prompted earnest efforts to change how the place was run, but it didn’t. Instead, Chief Rodger Craddock told the City Council last week, police have handled 86 alcohol-related calls around Mak’s in the past year.

Many of those calls represented incidents that risked the safety of bar customers, bar employees and police officers. That’s not acceptable. So the council voted to ask OLCC to revoke the bar’s liquor license.

The bar’s lawyer argues that the owners aren’t responsible for mayhem erupting outside their doors. Some people who oppose revocation contend closing one rowdy bar will merely send the problem to another bar, and then another, as officials close one venue after another.

But those arguments assume a bar owner can’t control the bar’s atmosphere and its customers’ behavior. If that were true, every bar would be a combat zone. Most bars, however, are safe and reputable.

A responsible bar owner enforces standards of behavior. He controls how much alcohol is served. He builds and maintains his establishment’s reputation as a place where nonsense is not welcome. People who want to misbehave soon go elsewhere. If city and state officials relentlessly target bars that tolerate misbehavior, rowdy customers will have no choice but to grow up or go thirsty.

Mak’s owners have had a year to reform the place. They either couldn’t or wouldn’t. The council was right last week to recommend revoking the license.