After the aborted attempt to pass an ordinance liberalizing Carbondale's restrictions on liquor sales, I emailed Councilman Monty asking for his reasoning on not seconding the motion. Below, with his permission, is his response:
At the Council meeting, I gave an explanation of my reasons for not supporting the ordinance that was presented. Some of the reasons were technical, but others were substantive. One place I disagree with the Mayor and City Manager is the provision to move the south border of the area where liquor may be sold to the south City limits. I have no problem with removing the prohibition on the sale of alcohol south of Pleasant Hill Road. But a thorough review of the history of the provision in the City Code tells me that instead of amending the provision to move the south boundary, the entire provision should be removed from the City Code. Some people want to interpret the existing provision as allowing the sale of liquor anywhere in the City except south of Pleasant Hill Road. That is not what was intended when the provision was enacted. There are places in Carbondale that are "wet" and other places are "dry." The section of the City Code prohibiting sale of alcohol south of Pleasant Hill Road was meant to do just that, not declare that alcohol could be sold anywhere in the rest of the City. Otherwise, why would the City Code still have a provision on how you change unoccupied commercially zoned property from "dry" to "wet?"
During the election, and even now in comments about the Council's "inaction" on the liquor issue, the emphasis has consistently been on allowing grocery stores to sell beer and wine. I do not have any problem with that. I have reservations about allowing grocery stores to sell "hard liquor." I also have reservations about allowing convenience stores and gas stations to sell alcohol. When you look at the ordinance that was proposed, it not only allows grocery stores, gas stations and convenience stores to sell alcohol, but it also removes all caps on the number of licenses. I think this is going to far too fast. I would rather take this a step at a time. Start with allowing the sale of beer and wine in grocery stores. After a reasonable period of time when we can assess what the impact has been, then the City Council may or may not want to go further. Although I don't buy everything in the thick packet of information the current package liquor store licensees provided to the Council, we should not dismiss the substantial body of research that shows a strong correlation between the "density" of alcohol establishments in a community and the incidence of problems such as under-age drinking, domestic violence, sexual abuse, DUI, etc. I think much of this density factor can be attributed to bars and nightclubs, but some of it has to do with the availability of locations where alcohol can be purchased for off-premise consumption. I think we need to do a careful balancing act here. We want shoppers to be able to have more convenient access to beer and wine when they are shopping for food. We want more competition in the liquor market place. But we also have to consider what would happen if you suddenly go from 8 establishments able to sell package liquor to 36 places (all the grocery stores, convenience stores, gas stations, drug stores, and existing package liquor stores).
Contrary to what many in the public see as a simple issue, it is quite complicated. It is only reasonable to allow the Liquor Advisory Board an opportunity to discuss the Mayor's proposal and mine in their full detail before the City Council reaches a decision. However, it is my desire that this issue be resolved no later than the August 16 Council Meeting.
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