Governor Patrick proposes eliminating liquor license cap

[keithn.livejournal.com]

In what could end up being great news for Somerville, Governor Patrick has proposed eliminating the liquor license cap for towns and cities across the state. This would eliminate what has (ostensibly) been a major hurdle preventing new restaurants from opening in Somerville.

More details: http://www.masslive.com/politics/index.ssf/2014/05/gov_deval_patrick_proposes_to.html

From the article:

"That giant sigh of relief you probably heard was Mayor Joe Curtatone,” joked Gardner Mayor Mark Hawke, referring to the Somerville mayor who was not in attendance.

Curtatone appeared with Boston Mayor Thomas Menino and Salem Mayor Kim Driscoll at a legislative hearing in August to testify in favor of legislation to eliminate the cap, arguing that restaurant owners find it difficult to locate in Somerville because of a lack of available licenses.

I'm not sure what resistance there will be to this, but current restaurant owners will have something to lose, as their liquor licenses (which are transferable) will no longer have any value.

Comments

[dfan.livejournal.com]

There seems to be a contingent of people continually concerned about the "growing culture of alcohol" in the Davis Square area (mostly recently during the Beer Works proposal), so I can imagine some resistance there.

[puffy-wuffy.livejournal.com]

Is it true that the proposal also would make current licenses no-value (non-transferable), or are you referring to the fact that current owners could be forced out by competition?

A liquor licenses racket with more available licenses will create more competition and (key to the reason why the City is pursuing this) more revenue. Plus, most cities forced under the cap tend to go over their quota. For every extra license they have to appeal to the State due to a law written 100 years ago (except for certain lucky exempt cities), and its extra man-hours on all sides to do this.

As far as I can tell, and I could be wrong, the removal of the cap would put the City of Somerville in charge of liquor licensing. Therefore, if the law goes into effect as is, the City will decide the new limits of the liquor licenses racket.