Alcohol campaign promises growth

Queen City voters will decide once again on a ballot initiative that would allow the legal sale of all alcoholic beverages for off-premises consumption.

Proponents claim that its passage will bring prosperity to the city and are confident of a favorable outcome after the same initiative failed in 2014 by only 33 votes.

Founding Partner and CEO John Hatch of Texas Petition Strategies (TPS) based in Buda, Tex. has conducted more than 350 petition efforts in over 200 Texas jurisdictions since 2003 with an 82% success rate and worked with clients for the passage of similar initiatives in the cities of Nash, Daingerfield, Gilmer, Marshall, Texarkana, DeKalb, New Boston, Redwater, Wake Village, Atlanta and Hughes Springs.

Contracted with CEFCO Convenience Stores to promote the Queen City initiative, Hatch boasts a hefty client list including Brookshires Grocery Company which hired the firm in 2016 to promote beer and wine off-premises sales in Atlanta. The measure passed with 53.63% voting in favor and 46.37% voting against—1,019 to 881.

“More than 500 communities in Texas have approved alcohol sales in the last 15 years. There have been more than 1500 petitions issued to legalize alcohol sales and only 15 petitions for prohibition”, Hatch said.

When TPS became involved in the effort, Hatch found that the petition had already been successfully completed by Queen City resident Jeff Parker.

Parker gathered signatures from the required 35% of registered voters who had participated in the 2018 election—155 signatures. He submitted 158 certified signatures in Oct. 2019.

Parker said that “an overwhelming number of people were for it”, adding, “for every person who said ‘no’, five were saying ‘yes’.”

“Atlanta, Linden, Domino, Texarkana, any direction you drive out of Queen City to go buy something, you can get at least beer and wine”, Parker said, “I don’t really care if people drink or not, if they’re going to drink anyway, I would rather those tax dollars be spent in my town.”

“Queen City is dying as it is. We’re not gaining businesses, we’re losing businesses. We need this”, Parker said.

Neither Hatch nor Parker have fielded much opposition, and efforts by the Journal-Sun to get an opposing viewpoint on the record have been unsuccessful so far.

When asked about the opposition, Hatch said there are typically two points of contention—alcohol-related crime and additional revenue.

“It’s now 2020. We’ve been having these elections now for 16 years. It’s no longer a science experiment. We have over 550 communities in Texas that have now voted wet. If you want to know what happened with sales tax or you want to know what happened in crime, you can easily go to Texas Department of Public Safety to find stats or interview sheriffs and police chiefs in the counties where it’s passed.”

The Texas Comptroller’s Offce reports significant increases in tax revenues since the passage of similar initiatives in surrounding communities. Linden enjoys a 21.2 percent increase, approximately $71,000 per year since 2013. Atlanta has had an 11.5 percent increase, approximately $225,000 per year since 2015.

Hatch’s firm worked with clients to promote similar initiatives in Tyler and Nash where opponents argued that alcohol-related crime could increase due to the easy availability of beer and wine. According to the Tyler Morning Telegraph in 2015, Tyler Police Chief Gary Swindle said the opposite has happened.

“It has, in fact, decreased crime,” Swindle said, “People don’t have to drive as far to get their alcohol—they’re not running out to the county line in a hurry so the roads are far safer from intoxicated drivers.”

Former Nash Police Chief Doug Bowers said in 2015 that sales tax revenues were up 66% since their 2013 election.

“We have had no increase in crime or litter and we just lowered property taxes for our citizens thanks to the increase in revenue from beer and wine sales”, Bowers said.

The Journal-Sun was unable to reach Atlanta Police Chief Robin Betts before press time for comment about the impact of beer and wine sales on crime in Atlanta.

Additionally, alcohol distribution is crucial for Cass County public bars and private clubs, and its scarcity sheds light on how the industry has been governed in Texas and in most states for the better part of a century.

Texas has a “three-tier system” of alcohol regulation. Manufacturers, distributors and retailers (the three tiers) must remain independent and without any financial interests in each other. Most states adopted similar rules after Prohibition was repealed in the 1930s to combat organized crime.

“You cannot be in more than one tier. You can either manufacture it, distribute it, or sell it at the retail level but you can’t be in more than one tier”, Hatch said, “One exception is the local liquor distributor. A liquor distributor is the only one allowed to be in two tiers, and only package liquor stores can act as both retailer and distributor.”

Under Texas law, establishments such as restaurants, bars and clubs (on-premises sales), must purchase its liquor from a licensed distributor in the county in which it operates if one exists.

A county without a package liquor store frees those establishments to purchase inventory outside of their county so long as they are willing to physically fetch the inventory.

Every on-premises sales establishment in Bowie County could purchase inventory statewide until recently when an all-alcohol initiative in Maud passed and state law required the many bars and restaurants in Texarkana to begin purchasing its inventory from those package liquor stores in Maud that also serve as distributors.

The passage of all-alcohol sales in Maud has reportedly threatened the continued distribution of alcohol in Cass County.

Domino Package Store in Domino, one of only two package liquor stores in Cass County and the only distributor, was recently sold, and according to sources could be relocating to Maud to reap the benefits of distributorship in Bowie County.

An employee of the Domino liquor store would not confirm in a telephone interview that plans were to remain in the area.

For Monica Teague, owner of MJ’s Bar and Grill in Domino, access to distribution is crucial for her business, and having more than one source for purchasing inventory would bring competition and potentially bring down her costs.

“I am all for Queen City selling beer, wine and liquor, especially if a liquor store decides to become a distributor”, Teague said.

“The advantage here for Queen City”, Hatch said, “Is if they pass this version, whoever opens that store in Queen City, if they wanted to be a distributor, would be able to be a distributor and the city would be able to reap the economic gain.”