Agenda - Council - 11/24/1992 - Laserfiche WebLink

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CAgE QUESTION OF SQUARE FOOT REQUIREMENT FOR OFF-SALE LIQUOR ESTABLISHMENTS By: Police Chief Mike Auspos and Zoning Administrator Sylvia Frolik Background: During the recent license renewals for off-sale liquor sales, the question came up regarding the 4,000 square foot requirement for off-sale liquor stores. Specifically, this concerned Ratph's Highway #10 Liquors in that at one time the business had over the 4,000 square foot minimum requirement and now, due to the opening of a pawn shop licensed by the CID', the off-sale portion has less than 4,000 square feet available for retail sales and storage. The license was granted for the 1992-1993 year and, during the ensuing ten months, Staff was to check into the histo~' of the square foot requirement and to determine its necessiB'. Observntions: Under the old City Code, Chapter !30.09, Ordinance #?8-2, adopted in May 1978, there was a 6.000 square foot requirement; .3,000 square feet on the ground floor and 3,000 square feet in a basement for storage. The space was to be used totally for the use of off-sale liquor. Again under the old CiB' Code, Ordinance #79-8, adopted in August 1979, amended Ordinance #78-2 to require a minimum of 2,000 square feet on the ground floor level and 2,000 square feet either in the basement or ~ound floor for storage. The entire space was to be devoted exclusively to the use of the off-sale liquor establishment. I have reviewed the Ad Hoc Liquor and License Commission Report presented to Ramsev City Council on November 11, 1981 and it makes no comment as to the rationale for any square foot requirement in that stud>'. Present Cip,, Code, Section 7.53.11, Subd. 6, requires 4,000 square feet of area consisting of public sa.les display area and/or private storage area and all this area must be for exclusive use of the off-sate liquor business. ] have been unable to find any minutes of discussions regarding this subject either of the City Council or in the Ad Hoc Liquor and License Committee Report,. Information regarding square foo: recmirement has been veto' hard to come up wirJ',, The majofiLv of the Metro .~,-ea cities i called have called nave municipal owned liquor stores and those that cion:T tell me their ordinances have no soua.re footage requirements. None of the city clerks or licensing persons I spoke with had any idea of the histou' of such a requirement. The Leag-ue of Minnesota Cities sent me information by none of it dealt specifically with the su~ect we have in our ordinance. Their model ~dinance contains no reference to square footage requirements. The closest I could find is a reference in Brooldvn Park's ordinance to a requirement that off-sale liouor licenses be limited to commercial areas having 50,000 square feet of commemial srmce. I believe this is to lirmt them to what could be called qua.LiD, shopping mails or strips. Coon Rapids recently sold their municipal liauor outlets to private parries and, a~ an acimirtedlv pmtecnon,s: move, us~ the 4.500 squa.m foot space of their smaliest store as a stancianS. Thi's was meant to ~x,e some tempora:"y edge to the buyers thereby ma.king the deal more am'active. Another reason advanced by them ,,,,'as that this would tend to keep small stores ou:. thereby iessening the num't~r of places that the .r~iice would have to monitor for problems.