City Council Preview - July 21 (Guidelines)

Yesterday we looked at the background surrounding the issue of allowing the sale of beer and wine in an area that is already over-saturated with stores selling beer and wine. The issue is fairly important because there is a wealth of data that shows clearly that the more stores you have selling alcohol, the more people drink. Interested readers can e-mail me and get a copy of the 34 page paper which contains some of this research. In a separate article, I showed the relationship between the number of alcohol outlets and serious crime and DUIs here in Orange County, which confirms locally what others have found across the world..

Just because increasing the number of alcohol outlets may increase the serious crime and DUI arrests, it still remains to be considered on a case by case basis, whether or not the merits in a specific circumstance warrant making an exception and allowing more stores into an area already over-saturated. Today I’ll discuss guidelines for helping decide whether or not that exception should be made.

GUIDELINES

The Council has been waiting for more than a year to get guidelines for how to deal with the issuance of PCNs. It was felt that guidelines were necessary to prevent capricious judgments, because the law is not definitive and therefore what is “convenient” or “necessary” is subject to varying interpretations. Guidelines would help the applicants, the staff, the Planning Commission, and the Council in making their deliberations.

Because the staff has been so lax in providing the Council with guidelines, I went through the literature myself months ago and came up with what I considered reasonable questions to ask when trying to decide whether or not a business meets the criteria of “public necessity” and/or “public convenience”. I also found some items that I considered dis-qualifiers or non-starters. Here are the fruits of my labor and the questions I intend to ask on Tuesday and the questions I intend to ask my colleagues to include in the forth-coming guidelines should they ever appear –

DISQUALIFIERS

1. Is there a history of the business or the company not meeting the law in general, or specifically in selling beer and wine?

2. Are there elevated rates of alcohol-related crime, health (e.g., liver disease), welfare (e.g., homelessness) and safety (e.g., DUI) indicators in the district?

3. Is there proximity to sensitive land uses (e.g., schools, parks, youth centers, child care facilities, homeless shelters, group homes for recovering addicts)? Will “at risk” groups have increased access to beer and wine at this location?

PUBLIC NECESSITY

1. Is the company going out of business unless it sells beer and wine? How many jobs are at staff? Are sales generally declining for this business? If so, are there comparable case studies to demonstrate that by selling beer and wine, other similar businesses have been able to stay in business?

2. If the company sells beer and wine, will there by new employment opportunities for Lake Forest residents? Will it be necessary to hire additional staff or will the existing sales staff handle the additional items?

3. If the company sells beer and wine, will there be an increase in the sales tax revenue for the City? Will this new sales outlet cannibalize sales from other outlets or actually generate new customers?

PUBLIC CONVENIENCE

1. Is the tract already fully saturated according to ABC standards?

2. Are there other outlets near to the proposed business, even if they lie outside the proposed tract? How close is the nearest business that sells beer and wine?

3. Are the hours of operation going to be significantly expanded as a result of this new business?

4. Is the business going to provide some new product which is unique with regard to price, quality, and/or variety?

SUMMARY

Apart from the disqualifiers, the answer to any one of these individual items would not be determinate, but taken in whole, the questions represent the information I believe is necessary in order to make an informed decision that is in the best interests of the City.

Business owners have rights and consumers have rights, but in my opinion, the role of the City is to weigh these rights against the safety, health, and welfare of all the people.

BTW – if you have any suggestions to add questions that you believe would be helpful in making the determination, please e-mail me at GardnerForCouncil@gmail.com or post them at Lake Forest Town Square.

Tomorrow we’ll discuss the Police contract which is on the agenda for July 21.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Dr. Jim Gardner is on the City Council for Lake Forest. You can check him out on LinkedIn and/or Facebook and you can share your thoughts about the City at Lake Forest Town Square on Facebook. His comments are not meant to reflect official City Policy.

Dr. Gardner has office hours every Tuesday from 3 pm to 5 pm at the City Hall. In addition, he holds a mini town meeting every month. The next meeting will be on August 15 at 2 pm at the El Toro Public Library.