MADISON, Wis. -- Badger football games and beer gardens are again the focus of a potential showdown between the city and Stadium Bar and Eatery on Monroe Street.

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The popular, large Stadium Bar and Eatery and its beer garden are a favorite with Badger fans on game days, but the owners claim they've come under fire unfairly.

But the city and the Stadium Bar said they are hopeful they can resolve the issues so the city Plan Commission doesn't have to at an upcoming public hearing.

The key issues involve how the bar does business, whether it will be forced to change and how it might fight back.

City zoning officials have requested a Plan Commission public hearing to get a clarification on what the Stadium Bar's conditional use permit, or CUP, allows it to do, both inside and out.

Of most concern to city zoning officials and some neighborhood alders is the use of a beer garden that holds more than 2,400 people.

Joel Plant, of the Mayor's Office, said for the last couple of years the city has had problems with the bar being overcapacity or not having capacity numbers available readily.

Plant also said the bar has had problems closing by 10 p.m. -- the mandatory closing time for beer gardens for late Badger games.

The bar's co-owner said its stops serving at 9 p.m. for Badger night games, but that getting everybody out by 10 p.m. is difficult.

"(For) the night games especially, we need to have some sort of a change in how to time the end of the game and how our beer garden operates," said James Luedtke, manager and co-owner with two others of the Stadium Bar.

Bar owners believes the bar has been scrutinized unfairly for no good reason and said it has been doing business as usual. The bar said it has no citations or tickets.

That's true, but Plant said the city tries to avoid enforcement in lieu of working with businesses, and that up until recently, that's been tough with the Stadium Bar.

He says there are a number of concerns about complying with the bar's conditional use permit.

"What we have is a conditional use permit holder who's had some problems following some of the conditions over -- not just a couple of weeks or months -- but a couple of years. And it's intermittent. Sometimes it's better than others."

Luedtke said he and his partners would like to see a resolution but don't want to give up any of their business rights either.

"We are willing to do everything we can to make this work out, but we also have our livelihoods at stake here. We definitely will protect that livelihood if we have to," he said.

Luedtke said the conditional use permit the bar got grandfathered into allows it to operate a beer garden for all special events, including Badger games, up until midnight.

But the city and some alders don't believe it does, and that's the main rub.

Two weeks ago, the controversy with Badger games and beer gardens flared up. Patrons called a couple alders after the beer garden closed at 10 p.m., after frustrated bar owners posted the mayor and alders' city Web page phone numbers on a big outdoor screen.

The mayor was "mad" about that when he met with bar owners last week. He called it in "poor taste."

Alder Robbie Webber, a Stadium Bar critic, agreed, saying it's not appropriate to contact alders in that situation and that "prompting" people to call after they've been drinking is not a good "business technique."