Free At Last!
A look at booze reform in our brave new post-private-club world
By Eric S. Peterson @ericspeterson
Liquor liberation has come! The idea
of state control of private clubs has
been banished to Outer Darkness.
And Utahns across the land can toast
to the fact that a Republican, conservative
state is finally “de-socializing” the booze
biz. But is the war over?
Far from it, say hospitality advocates who
have barely taken a pause to celebrate before
planning for the next legislative session. No
hangover can keep reformers from building
on the momentum of recent successes to
seek new concessions: One goal is for bars
to be able to purchase alcohol from the state
at wholesale prices, while another is to see
more than two bars on a city block.
“We were told initially, back in late winter
of 2007, that there was no possible way
we would accomplish any changes in the
liquor laws,” says attorney Lisa Marcy, a
liquor-reform advocate and president of the
Utah Hospitality Association, of her group’s
encounters with legislators. “We don’t
want this to turn into a situation where
everybody’s going to thumb their noses and
[just] go pub crawling and get completely
inebriated. Our next meeting will be about
prioritizing different issues.”
The association is still huddling to
determine its priorities for 2010, but it is
already lobbying for reforms before the
next legislative session. One issue is the
requirement for bars to purchase high
alcohol-content beer at retail prices. This
means the high-octane stuff can’t be
purchased wholesale, but at liquor-store
prices. Bars, then, have to mark up the price
on beer to make it profitable to sell.
“Most [bars] can’t possibly pass those
costs on to customers,” Marcy says. Marked
up, the price of most tasty imports is out
of the average drinker’s budget (a good
Belgium import could easily run $10 to $15
from the state liquor store).
Another issue likely to be at the forefront
of future liquor-reform wrangling will be
changing the state’s current two-bars-per-city-block formula. A similar idea was
floated by Salt Lake City Mayor Ralph Becker
recently in hopes of livening up downtown
with an entertainment district.
For Marcy, the most logical way to reduce
the number of drunken drivers on the road is
to group bars closer together. “We’ve never,
ever thought that you should keep this large
spatial distance between [bars],” Marcy says.
Salt Lake City’s municipal ordinances might
become a proving ground for testing the
viability of bars being a viable component of
a walkable (or stumble-able) neighborhood.
The city recently approved an ordinance
that permits a beer bar like Andy’s Place
at 479. E. 300 South to operate as a full
bar within a residential mixed-use zone.
Another bar, The Jam, at 751 N. 300 West,
is in the process of seeking a similar
ordinance change.
Marcy realizes it won’t be easy to
accomplish back-to-back legislative reforms.
But she’s also used to hearing what “can’t”
be done.
“Basically, we were told before that we
couldn’t, and then we did,” Marcy says.
“And now, we´re going to do it again.”
|
Big Brother’s Scanner A City Weekly reporter got his ID test-scanned at the downtown Murphy’s Bar & Grill on Main with an orange Codecorp scanner that looked like a price gun. With a little blue-and-red twinkle, the barcode was scanned, and the display showed a name and an age. Bartenders see all the pertinent info they need, so they can quickly check the scanner and then match the ID photo with the mug of the guy or gal who gave it to them. Like several other models City Weekly looked at—despite what’s shown on the display screen—additional details besides name and age are captured. But all data is deleted after seven days. A variety of companies market scanners sold across the country—so there’s no 100 percent guarantee that models won’t download additional info that’s encoded in the ID bar code, such as Social Security numbers. However, DABC compliance officers and law enforcement will be regularly screening the scanners to make sure they are deleting the information and taking only the info they are required to—with criminal penalties for bar owners who don’t know how to use their new toys, or aren’t playing nice with them. |
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