Provides for the issuance of temporary retail permits by the state liquor authority; repealer

Title of bill

An act to amend the alcoholic beverage control law, in relation to the issuing of temporary retail permits; and to repeal section 97-a of such law relating thereto

Purpose

To authorize the State Liquor Authority to issue temporary retail permits under certain circumstances.

Summary of provisions

Section one - authorized the liquor authority to issue a temporary retail permit to: the transferee of a retail license to continue the operations of a retail premises during the period a transfer application for the license from person to person at the same premises is pending; or to an applicant for a premises that is not licensed in a municipality with a population of less than one million.

The permit shall be issued if all of the following conditions are met:

1) the applicant for the temporary retail permit shall have filed with the authority an application for a retail license at such premises, together with all required filing and license fees;

2) the applicant shall have filed with the authority an application for a temporary retail permit, accompanied by a nonrefundable filing fee of either one hundred twenty-eight dollars for all retail beer licenses or six hundred forty dollars for all other retail licenses;

3) in the case of a transfer application, the premises shall have been operated under a retail license within thirty days of the date of filing the application for a temporary permit; and

4) in the case of a transfer application, the current license in effect at said premises must be surrendered or placed in safekeeping with the authority.

The temporary permit shall be issued for a period not to exceed ninety days, however it may be extended at the discretion of the authority for an additional thirty days. In addition, the holder of the temporary permit is required to pay in currency or cash on or before delivery. The authority also has the ability to cancel or suspend such temporary permit at any time for good cause and shall notify the holder in writing.

Section two - contains the effective date.

Justification

It has been well documented that there is an extremely long backlog at the State Liquor Authority (SLA) in regard to processing liquor licenses. In some cases, the process can take as much as six months from the date the application is filed until a license is granted. This waiting period has hindered many restaurants, bars and convenience stores from being successful. While the 2007-08 Enacted State budget authorized the hiring of additional personnel for the express purpose of addressing this issue, those positions were not filled until early 2008. In order to ensure that businesses just starting out are not adversely impacted by this backlog, the Legislature feels it is necessary to authorize the SLA to issue a temporary retail permit to certain applicants and under specific criteria.

Legislative history

2008: S.7913 Passed Senate FISCAL IMPLICATIONS : None to the State.

Effective date

This act shall take effect immediately.