Alcohol Law Proposal Goes to Planning Panel

The Walnut Creek Planning Commission on Thursday will hold the first public hearing on a much-talked-about draft of a new city ordinance (see attached PDF) intended to regulate establishments selling alcohol.

The commission meets at 7 p.m. Thursday in the Council Chamber at City Hall, 1666 N. Main St. After the Planning Commission hearing, the normal progress would be for the ordinance to get a hearing at the City Council level.

The city is forwarding a "nuisance-based" law, explained this way in a staff report by the Community Development Department and City Attorney's Office: "These performance standards differ from CUP (conditional use permit) conditions in that they are general in nature, can be applied to all alcoholic beverage establishments equally, and focus on nuisance and criminal activity that may be associated with alcoholic beverage sales rather than land use. Thus, under a deemed approved ordinance, the sale and service of alcoholic beverages is a deemed approved activity so long as the alcoholic beverage establishment complies with the general performance standards required of the deemed approved status."

The staff report and the draft of the proposed law are PDFs attached to this article.

2004 law

The staff report explores the history of city regulation, including the 2004 passage of an ordinance that implemented a CUP requirement for new alcoholic beverage establishments in the Pedestrian Retail district, with restaurants and bars from before 2004 "grandfathered in" — operating under state alcoholic beverage law and not requiring a CUP. Today, 57 establishments operate without a CUP and 46 with a CUP.

Post-2004, the staff report states, "Although most new restaurants did not create a need for police services, the overall number of inebriated patrons converging in the downtown began to place a significant demand on City resources, with these effects being most pronounced between the hours of 11 p.m. and 3 a.m."

The city is aiming for consistent standards and enforcement. The report states:
"The nuisance-based performance standards that would apply to all alcoholic beverage establishments, including legal nonconforming, or grandfathered, establishments and new establishments, would give the City a tool that could be used to correct public nuisances associated with establishments that do not operate responsibly or in compliance with state or local law. Grandfathered establishments that operate lawfully and responsibly would not become the focus of a deemed approved enforcement action."

City leaders have talked about a nuisance-based law in the context of concern about a series of brawls rolling out of downtown bars around closing time on weekends. In February, using the existing CUP process, including scaling its alcohol service time from 12:30 a.m. to 11:30 p.m.