Alcohol proposals draw crowd to council chambers

Concerned citizens packed City Coun-cil chambers at the four-hour-long Feb. 11 council meeting to air their views on alcohol-related ordinances.

Council considered four ordinances concerning alcohol, approving one which allows the Springfield Little Theatre to apply for a permit to sell alcohol.

Parks and booze

The most controversial first reading proposal drew eight speakers in favor and 20 speakers in opposition, including several pastors and law enforcement officers.

The ordinance, submitted by Council-man Bob Chancellor at the request of the Springfield-Greene County Parks Board, would allow alcohol sales at certain park events.

The park board had voted 5-3 to re-quest the power to allow alcohol sales at specific places, times and events in park-owned facilities.

The bill would make exceptions to the alcoholic beverages portion of the city code, allowing the Park Board to have alcohol sales at state, regional or national adult softball tournaments or at after-hours events at the zoo.

Proponents want the ability to sell al-coholic beverages to increase attendance at certain sporting events and at fund raisers.

If the ordinance is approved, permitees must provide that the sale and consumption of alcohol be limited to a clearly identified adult-only area. Alcohol sales would be allowed only at on-site zoo fund raisers, adult-oriented tennis events at the Cooper Park tennis complex, the ice park in Jordan Valley, and golf courses.

Opponents, including Terry Moore, Missouri Highway Patrol spokesman, and Greene County Prosecutor Darrell Moore, want the city to reduce, not in-crease, point-of-sale opportunities. Pas-tors told council that encouraging alcohol sales was immoral and not its job.

Sidewalk cafes

An ordinance to define "restaurant" and "sidewalk cafe," to require downtown sidewalk cafes to have half their income derived from food, drew favorable comment from Bill Compere of the Urban Districts Alliance. He said UDA voted to support the ordinance. Ken Oeser, owner of a sidewalk bar, Cul-ley's Pub, spoke against the bill.

Oeser said he had corrected any problems that had arisen, including reducing the size of the cafe in front of his establishment at 311 Park Central West and more carefully monitoring his clientele. He said no one from UDA or the Downtown Springfield Association had ever personally approached him with any problems.

Sidewalk cafes were approved in 1988, "permitted in conjunction with the operation of an indoor restaurant." However, according to the council bill explanation, "definition of a restaurant includes taverns and drinking establishmetns serving only alcohol and not food, thus allowing alcohol only to be served on the public right of way. This was clearly not the intent of the ordinance, and there have been concerns expressed by citizens and staff for several years."

Little Theatre

Council approved an ordinance to amend the alcoholic beverages portion of the city code to allow liquor license permits to 501(c)(3) organizations within a defined downtown area, such as the Springfield Little Theatre. Council agreed to allow the theater to apply for a permit to sell 5 percent beer and light wine (14 percent alcohol) not more than four hours per day, five days a week.

DWI mobile

A proposed ordinance which had its first reading late in the meeting, after most of the speakers had left, concerned the city's applying for a DWI prevention mini-grant.

The grant, which needs no city matching funds, would be used to purchase a $235,620 motor coach vehicle equipped with radios, a mobile data terminal, port-able light tower, breath analyzer and lighted cones to be used at DWI check points.

Cable television

Council extended any action to Oct. 6 on the Mediacom Communications Cor-poration's cable franchise, which is six months past the franchise's eighth an-niversary date which requires council action. Council approved Mediacom's purchase of the AT&T Broadband franchise last summer.

In other action, council sent the issue of its getting into the cable business via City Utilities to council's Telecommuni-cations Committee.

The resolution that was sent to committee requests the Board of Public Util-ities to hire an independent consulting firm to conduct a comprehensive feasibility study on the prospect of whether CU could become a cable provider either alone or in a joint venture.