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City uncorks plan for BYOB at some restaurants
By adamg on Fri, 04/29/2016 - 11:09am
The Boston Licensing Board yesterday approved a plan to begin letting diners at restaurants without liquor licensing bring their own booze.
Before hearing requests from restaurants that want to begin BYOB, however, the board will first draft detailed licensing BYOB requirements and then hold a public hearing on its proposed rules. Drafting the new rules could take several months.
City Council President Michelle Wu and then Councilor Steve Murphy first proposed letting dry restaurants outside Boston Proper offer BYOB last year. In a statement today, Wu said:
BYOB will bring new vitality to our city by giving small business owners and consumers more options to build a vibrant restaurant scene in every neighborhood.
Neighborhoods:
Free tagging:
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Comments
Drafting the new rules could
If it takes several months to draft "rules" for byob, when you could just strike out the ban in 30 seconds, you're doing it wrong.
Oh well, baby steps I guess...
BYOB licenses will
be limited to 100 for Suffolk county and cost $300,000, because we need to think of the children.
Almost, but not quite
They will be issued by the city for $25 to
well-connecteddeserving applicants, who will immediately be free to resell them for $300,000.If you approve something before drafting the rules
on how it will be implemented, you're doing something wrong.
Will there be a provision
Will there be a provision that it won't be illegal to put a cork back in a half-finished bottle and take it home, either on foot or in a car?
So once again, we approve something
before the rules of how it will be implemented are in place. We obviously didn't learn anything from the medical marijuana fiasco, did we now.
Just like how
We banned alcohol without knowing the implications of it in the '20s. Give me a break, dude.
Getting the regulations right is important
Before the Council passed the ordinance in 2015, we heard from many stakeholders and also issued a set of draft regulations for the Licensing Board to consider. We want BYOB to enhance and grow the restaurant scene here, and that includes considerations around location/size/alcohol amount/corkage fees/insurance. You can read our proposed regs at: http://meetingrecords.cityofboston.gov/sirepub/view.aspx?cabinet=publish.... The Licensing Board has state-delegated authority to issue regs, so the Council couldn't formally pass these, but I will advocate for them in the Licensing Board's process.
One important note is that BYOB won't affect restaurants with liquor licenses because state law prohibits BYOB in establishments that have liquor licenses. Our goal is for BYOB to activate new spaces (making smaller spaces viable for restaurants), allow breakfast/lunch restaurants to expand into dinner hours, and to support niche cuisines. Greater density of restaurants strengthens business districts overall!
Or you could simply let
Or you could simply let restaurants that wish to host BYOB to have them BYOB. Why do they need the cities approval?
Why no restaurants in the North End, Downtown, South End etc? Why is it only for some neighborhoods? What business is it of yours if a small business in the North End hosts BYOB?
What are you accomplishing by banning the consumption of beverages you apparently don't like? Whisky is not an acceptable BYOB beverage? Why not?
Why should the restaurant have to pay the state $300 dollars for something they should be free to do?
Nah, your regulations are largely garbage.
Why the limitations?
Thanks for commenting. There's a few issues with the proposed regs in you link:
What about a real solution?
It would be great if BYOB can help some restaurants to open or stay open, particularly in the less wealthy areas of Boston. What about fixing the real problem?
The liquor license system is broken and corrupt, allowing connected individuals to extort restaurants with outrageous fees simply to sell a legal beverage. There's no way to open a restaurant with reasonable prices aimed at working people in an outlying neighborhood because those restaurants can't get investors to give them a quarter of a million dollars to purchase a license on the "open" market. The only other option that a small restaurant has is to get in line and hope that maybe a license comes available that isn't immediately grabbed by someone more connected than them.
A restaurant that can reasonably manage the sale of alcohol and benefits their neighborhood should receive a license. If they do not manage the sale properly, they may lose the license. Just getting rid of the false economy (created originally for discriminatory reasons) of liquor licenses will likely have an immediate effect on the rows of empty storefronts in many neighborhood centers, much more than BYOB might.
It's not just the neighborhoods that have the problem. Even in central areas of Boston, restaurant storefronts sit vacant for years for want of a liquor license. Many of the family run restaurants in Chinatown are awaiting licenses. And why the assumption that someone from a neighborhood would never come into central Boston for a good restaurant?
Yes, this situation is a pet peeve.
Tacky?
For some reason, it just seems tacky to me to bring your own booze to a restaurant. Is it just me?
I'm not exactly against it (I think people should be able to drink anywhere they please, actually, as long as it's not behind a wheel of a vehicle), I just would never do it. And I don't think I would want to go to a restaurant where people did this. Am I just nuts?
Because there are too many
Because there are too many restaurants that would be a natural fit for a liquor license that due to asinine state and city reg are otherwise unable to get them.
I agree
Yes, I understand the need for this. The limitation on liquor licenses is ridiculous.
Yes
It's just you.
It's not tacky if the
It's not tacky if the restaurant allows and encourages it.
You're just nuts
The standard markup for a bottle of wine in a nice restaurant is literally 100%. Why on earth would you turn down the chance to a) have exactly the wine you want and b) pay half the price for it??
100%?
Try 200 or 300 instead! As for fefu, I guess his/her trust fund check is big enough to pay that markup and cringe at all the unwashed plebes who show up with their own bottle.
Yes, it's just you. There are
Yes, it's just you. There are many other world class cities where this is allowed and it definitely does not negatively affect the experience of the other guests in any way.
Of course it does!
How are you supposed to feel rich and important after plopping down $150 for a $40 bottle when those dirty plebes one table over just pulled not one but two of those bottles from their Blanchards bag?
Nice strawman argument
But, alas, it won't happen: The regulations are just going to apply to restaurants without liquor licenses.