Published: March 15, 2006 01:10 pm      

Act would ease liquor-sale rules

Could city draw more restaurants downtown?

Downtown restaurants could purchase liquor licenses at will, exempt from state-imposed quotas, in a redevelopment-inspired proposal on the city council’s agenda Thursday.

A state law that took effect in 2004 allows any city to designate a riverfront district where quotas wouldn’t apply. New Albany’s would encompass most of the area between Elm Street and the river, from E. 5th Street to Scribner Drive.

Three-way licenses, allowing the sale of beer, wine and liquor, cost $1,000 a year. State law allows only one license per 1,500 residents and New Albany’s are all taken, said economic development director Paul Wheatley, who crafted the resolution. A restaurateur who wants one must buy it used from its owner — at a considerable markup — or warrant a special exemption for a new one by demonstrating $50,000 in annual food sales.

Dave Scopelliti’s Federal Hill Cafe establishment sells more than that, so he was confident his current application for a three-way license would be met anyway. But he said he welcomed the possibility of more restaurants.

“I think it’s a great idea. Unfortunately, I think it’s going to draw chain restaurants in instead of independent restaurants,” Scopelliti said. “But I’ll support anything they put down the street, whether it’s Applebee’s or Hooters or whatever. Whatever it takes to get people into New Albany.”

New Albany has tried to woo locally-based restaurateurs to its downtown, Wheatley said, but some of those told the administration the liquor-license quota was a deterrent, especially given the looser restrictions across the river in Kentucky. Moreover, the city can’t attract new restaurants with the food-sale provision, because they’d have to do business for a year to prove that capability.

Those factors, plus the advancement of the Scribner Place project, spurred city officials to set up the proposed quota-exempt area.

Mayor James Garner stressed the resolution did not mean “open-alcohol season.” Asked how much the desire to lure traffic from Caesar’s played a part in the plan, Garner responded, “Part of making it (downtown) a destination is stopping people from coming through your city. Is there any product or service they would stop for other than gas?”

“People from New Albany are going to Jeffersonville, Clarksville and Louisville to eat,” Garner said. “We want them to stay here. We want to monopolize that.”

The quota-exemption resolution would also apply to prospective hotels, Garner added: “I think a hotel is definitely an option for New Albany.”

John Fondrisi, manager & founder of Rocky’s Italian Grill in Jeffersonville, was asked if the prospective riverfront competition worried him.

“Worry us? No, not at all; bring ’em on!” Fondrisi said. “Bring in six Olive Gardens and four Macaroni Grills (to New Albany). It doesn’t bother me a bit after 30 years of business. The more the merrier.”

ON THE NET

The Indiana Alcohol & Tobacco Commission: www.in.gov/atc