Thirty-day

suspensions of alcohol licenses of 20

Fayetteville businesses caught last summer

selling to minors will begin Jan. 1, after the

holiday celebrations are over.

After

hearing the pleas of seven restaurant owners for

clemency, City Council Monday declared the

businesses guilty of two code sections in city

law that require license checks when selling

alcohol and prohibit sales to minors.

Half

the businesses in the city with beer and wine

licenses were caught selling to minors in a

police sting last June. Seven owners of affected

restaurants and convenience stores Monday

exercised their right to a hearing in the matter.

Failure

to check a license, if it results in a sale to a

minor, carries a minimum, nonnegotiable, 30-day

license suspension, according to city attorney

David Winkle. The law also provides for a

suspension of "up to" 30 days for

selling to a minor, he said, but added that the

suspensions can run concurrently.

According

to some of the restaurant owners, the suspensions

are almost tantamount to a death sentence in

their business.

"The

ordinance is very harsh indeed," said Cary

Wiggins, a lawyer for the El Ranchero restaurant

chain. The chain has served alcohol in

restaurants all over the city for over 12 years

without a similar violation, he said, adding that

the company takes great pains to emphasize the

need for alcohol license checks with its

employees.

The

theme was repeated by the other restaurant owners

or the representatives. None disputed the facts

in the cases - they admitted that their

employees had failed to check licenses and had

sold alcohol to the city Police Department's

under-aged informant, but they urged City Council

to consider reducing the penalty if possible, or

to review the ordinance for possible changes in

the future.

month's suspension may not seem harsh, said

Wiggins, but for many restaurants alcohol sales

provide their only profit.

"Alcohol

sales are 14 percent of our entire revenue,"

said Susan Boutier, owner of Village Cafe,

another restaurant caught in the sweep.

"That's equal to our rent, our bank loan and

[the owners'] salaries for a month." And,

she said, many customers will stay away if they

can't have a glass of wine with their meals.

Worse,

said owners, the law requires a 12-month

suspension for a second offense, and there is no

time limit after which the slate is wiped clean.

If his client were to slip up a second time, said

Wiggins, "they would be as good as

dead."

That

provision puts owners in a position where they

could be put out of business by a disgruntled

employee, said Paul Carter, owner of Fayette

Family Billiards. Carter's business was not one

of those caught in the police sting, but he spoke

up during the council's public comment period.

So

did Richard Capella, representing Classic Cue,

another business that did not sell to minors.

"It's important to direct the legislation to

the individuals who are committing the

offense," he said.

Many

of the employees are underage themselves, said

Wiggins, and if they are caught selling to minors

they can't work in a business where alcohol is

sold for five years, also a harsh provision,

several restaurant owners argued.

The

father of one such employee made his own plea to

City Council to consider softening the ordinance.

"My daughter was three weeks out of high

school on her first job" when the violation

occurred, he said. "And she knew the

informant, and knew she had graduated three years

earlier and believed her to be of age," he

added.

Council

listened quietly to all those who spoke, but

voted unanimously to enforce the ordinance as

written.

The

discussion grew vitriolic when Gil Osterloh, a

consultant for Beverage Law Professionals, a

lobbying group out of Florida, addressed the

meeting.

Osterloh

said the city's law doesn't pass the test of

reasonableness, and added that when the state of

Florida's alcohol laws were made more lenient

recently, violations went down.

Councilman

Larry Dell said he previously lived in Florida,

and disputed Osterloh's claim. An argument

ensued, bringing a loud bang of the gavel from

Mayor Mike Wheat.

"We're

all in the phone book," he told Osterloh,

indicating that the council meeting wasn't the

proper forum to debate the statistics.

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