New rules in alcohol sales law dividing communities
Citizens cry “foul” after being surprised by a last minute amendment that radically alters the decision process that communities have been able to utilize for years.
From, Kentucky Citizen Digest, January/February, 2001.

While Kentucky may be famous for its bourbon and long history of bootlegging, a lesser known fact to outsiders is that alcohol use in the Commonwealth remains a hot topic. So the temperature increased considerably in the last General Assembly when the state legislature quickly and quietly passed SB247 — a bill that, among other changes, did away with the local option election framework.

The new law allows for a referendum to enable restaurants to sell alcohol if they have 100 or more seats and derive 70 percent of their receipts from food. Under the previous rules, if a city was not at least 4th class, then the entire county would be required to vote in order to legalize alcohol sales. Not any more. Now any size city can vote on the matter.

Other changes include allowing wet/dry votes to take place the same day of the general election and allowing a vote to come up as regularly as pro-alcohol supporters can muster enough signatures to place it on the ballot.

The law was supported by the Kentucky Restaurant Association and the tourism industry. Both argued alcohol sales in restaurants would be good for the economy. Stacy Roof, CEO of the Kentucky Restaurant Association, expects that more communities will want to explore going wet, however, she adds, “It’s up to communities to decide what’s right for them.’’

The change in the law has raised the ire of people who watched how the law originated. It started out as an alcohol-beverage control bill dealing primarily with licensing. So tame was the bill that two days before it was passed, the Temperance League of Kentucky signed off on it. Then the bill turned into something that hardly resembled its original intent. Observers claim the bill was hijacked in the last moments of the process, and according to Claude Witt of the Temperance League, it was “clandestinely done.”

Opponents further view this effort as a divide-and-conquer strategy. Dr. Tom Green of Calloway Countians for KIDS (Keeping It Dry and Safe) said the reason the referendum passed in his city was “because there was a feeling it was in a controlled setting.” He explained that if the vote was over bars or liquor stores it would have probably failed, but restaurants offer a respectable setting. Green and others have argued that once alcohol is welcomed into the community in any venue, it will eventually be accepted and spread to all parts of the county. Before the vote 75 of the state’s 120 counties were dry.

Twelve cities or counties voted on the restaurant law last November (see sidebar). Half of the measures passed, some by very close margins. Five more cities are scheduled to vote this December and January (Glasgow, Calvert City, Grand Rivers, Somerset and Burnside).

Other cities are expected to see the measure come up for a vote in 2001, but pro-wet supporters may have a harder time garnering the required petition signatures due to the high voter turnout in the last election. The law requires that the measure can only be put on the ballot when 25 percent of the total voters from the last election sign a petition.

In Hazel, the smallest community voting, only 11 signatures were needed to put it on the ballot; that’s because only 44 people voted in the previous election.

“Your vote does count,” said Hazel pastor and activist, Tim Cole.  He and others defeated the measure by a mere 46 votes.

Alcohol supporters have successfully cast the issue in terms of economics. They argue that more restaurants would be drawn into communities if they could sell alcohol. Steve Barno, Radcliff’s acting city planner, says his dry city is losing money to surrounding communities where alcohol is legal. “It just kills me to watch everybody go out of town,” Barno said. “Why not spend that money here?”

Lee Williams, spokesman for Concerned Citizens for a Dry Radcliff, argues that it is about safety: “If a drunk-driving death occurs from a restaurant selling alcohol, are we going to hold them accountable like tobacco companies?”  Williams lost his wife and two daughters in 1988 when a drunk driver plowed into a church bus, killing 27 people in the nations worst drunk-driving accident.

Dwight Elam, a vocal opponent of alcohol sales in Georgetown held that the issue is not about economics. “Ruby Tuesday preferred to come to a dry Scott County. . . ,” said Elam. “Scott County has a 3.1 percent unemployment rate — if it’s about economics, why don’t we open up services that open up houses of prostitution, crack houses and opium dens?”

The Temperance League of Kentucky is challenging the constitutionality of the law. The League is trying to convince the Kentucky Supreme Court that the law is discriminatory in nature, favor-ing or penalizing businesses based on size. The outcome isn’t expected until next year.

Regardless of what the court decides, Claude Witt, director of the Temperance League of Kentucky, said, “There’s every opportunity for a tavern to come in and disguise itself as a restau-rant . . . One thing is for sure, if people leave that place after drinking, they’re as much a threat to have an accident as if they bought it anywhere else.”

Wet/Dry Election Outcomes from Nov. 7
 

Radcliff	yes	3258	2185
Georgetown	yes	3509	2925
Murray	yes	2801	2433
Hazel	no	44	90
Kuttawa	yes	154	126
Guthrie	yes	191	165
Cadiz	no	316	490
Crittenden County	no	1622	2314
Harrodsburg	no	1093	1445
Jamestown	no	242	362
Shelby County	yes 6811	407

 
 
 

Key Family Foundation Contacts: Kent Ostrander, Executive Director Martin Cothran, Senior Associate Policy Analyst