The Safety and Licensing Committee met 12/08/2021. Amongst the items they took up were the Class A and Class B alcohol license applications for Tee Tees Nachos.
Both of these applications were initially recommended for approval by the committee. Alderperson William Siebers (District 1) then referred them back to the committee and expressed concerns about alcohol licenses being granted for an establishment that was so close to a residential neighborhood. The committee eventually voted to deny the Class A license and hold the Class B vote until the 12/08/2021 meeting.
While this was going on, the special use permit application for Tee Tee’s Nachos was being considered by the City Plan Commission. This special use permit was necessary, in addition to the Class B permit the Safety and Licensing Committee was considering, in order for the business to serve alcohol on the premises. The City Plan Commission did eventually vote to approve the special use permit.
Alderperson Katie Van Zeeland (District 5) is the chairperson of the Safety and Licensing Committee. Before starting opening the meeting up for discussion or public participation, she took some time to speak to the committee. She explained that these items had been held or referred back to the committee because the committee had had some questions that they hoped were going to be answered by the City Plan Commission as it considered and voted on the special use permit. She had spoken with the City Attorney’s office about these items and to clarify what belonged to the special use permit the City Plan Commission was considering and what belonged to the alcohol license applications the Safety and Licensing Committee was considering because, the last time the Safety and Licensing Committee talked about it, they didn’t seem to be clear on how those two things worked together.
A lot of the questions they had had regarding these applications were because there has never been a liquor license at this location previously, and there were concerns that if they allowed the licenses to go through that the city would not be able to regulate what happens in that neighborhood and at that establishment. Those concerns, however, should be answered by the special use permit. The special use permit indicates that it is for a painting and craft studio, so, if they wanted to turn it into a bar, they would need to apply for a new special use permit.
With that explanation, she opened the meeting up for public participation.
Timasha Thorton, the owner of the business, had not been at the previous Safety and Licensing Committee meetings because she had not known that she was allowed to attend. She did appear at this meeting, and she explained that the planned business was a paint and sip and they did not intend to turn it into a bar. She wanted to create a place where the community could come together and get to know each other and relax. It was not going to be a bar and no laws were going to be broken. The music would not be loud to the point of disturbing the neighborhood. The business would be run exactly as described to the city.
Seven other community members, including Nick Ross who is currently running for a seat on the AASD Board of Education and Cainan Davenport who owns Taperz Barber Shop and runs the People Of Progression community group, came and spoke in support of the business being grants the alcohol licenses. Three lived in District 1 which was the District this business would be located in, and three either work or have worked in District 1. A couple mentioned that it would be nice to have more Black owned businesses in the neighborhood, a couple pointed out that although it was located next to a residential neighborhood there was a lot of parking and plenty of space to work as a buffer, one appreciated that the city was taking its time reviewing this and giving the application the fair treatment and attention it deserved, and all of them were in favor of the license applications being approved and the business coming to the neighborhood.
[The only other community member I’m aware of who gave feedback about this was Dean who spoke at the public hearing that the City Plan Commission held back in November. He owned property right next to the building this business would be located in, and he had had some questions and concerns regarding the sale of alcohol on the premises.]
Alderperson Van Zeeland then opened up the Class A license application for discussion by the committee. [This was the license that would allow for the sale of packaged alcohol to be taken off-site which the committee had previously voted to deny and which had then been referred back to the committee for further consideration.]
Alderperson Michael Smith (District 10) had a couple questions about the staff report related to the special use permit which had been included in the Safety and Licensing Committee agenda packet even though the City Plan Commission had been the committee that voted on the special use permit. On page 4 of the report it was noted that one of the doors was labeled an exit “but is not a legal exit as it leads through an adjacent/independent lease space to reach the actual exit door.” Alderperson Smith asked if that issue had been resolved.
Principal Planner Don Harp answered that “the applicant still needs to work through their building permit process in order to occupy the space for this use, and that is…a standard that needs to be clarified and rectified before they take occupancy.” The special use permit requires building code compliance prior to occupancy and there was still work to be done on the back end of that.
Alderperson Smith clarified that the special use permit would not be issued before that work was done, and Principal Planner Harp confirmed that.
Alderperson Van Zeeland reminded the committee that they wanted to keep the discussion pertinent to the alcohol licenses before them. The building inspections and things of that nature would be handled by the City Plan Commission.
Alderperson Smith had another question about the special use permit which he thought was relevant because it talked about the serving and consumption of alcohol. The special use permit limited that serving and consumption to customers who were participating in the production and an arts and crafts project. He wondered how that would be monitored or policed.
A staff member [possibly someone from the attorney’s office] said he believed that was in the Municipal Code and also covered by state statute. The city would conduct their normal policing of these types of businesses which would mainly be driven by complaints.
During public comment, one of the speakers had mentioned this business as a place they would like to go for a date night, so Alderperson Smith asked if both people on a date night would need to be involved in some sort of craft project in order to drink alcohol. The staff member confirmed that was the case.
Alderperson Smith tried to get a better idea of how a paint and sip business worked and said that he had a business in his district that also serves alcohol but because of the nature of their business they limit the drinks to 2. He wondered if Tee Tees Nachos would similarly limit the amount of alcohol they served.
The staff member clarified that right then they were talking about the Class A license which would be the takeaway component of the business. The Class B license would cover the paint and sip portion of the business. [Class A licenses allow businesses to sell packaged alcohol that can be taken off-site. Class B licenses allow for on-site consumption of alcohol.]
Alderperson Van Zeeland reminded the committee that there were a few things they were looking at when it came to determining whether or not a license should be approved….
- Adverse impact on traffic
- Adverse impact on peace, quiet, and cleanliness of the neighborhood
- Insufficient parking
- Proximity to other licensed established, residential areas, schools, churches, hospitals
- Ability or inability of the police to provide law enforcement services to the new establishment
- The impact of the new establishment on the ability of the police to provide law enforcement services to the balance of the community at all times.
She said that a lot of those things were addressed in the special use permit.
Alderperson Sheri Hartzheim (District 13) had attended the City Plan Commission meeting earlier that day. She thought that, initially when the Safety and Licensing committee reviewed the Class A license and eventually recommended it for denial, that their concern was that people were going to walk away from the business with alcoholic beverages. She herself had voted against the denial at the time because “What’s our reasoning for denial? And if we don’t have one then are we treating this business differently than other businesses we might be looking at this same sort of application for?” She recommended that the committee approve the Class A license application. She also pointed out that the Class A license really didn’t have anything to do with the special use permit. [That was noted during the City Plan Commission meeting. The retail sale of alcohol was already allowed under the building’s C-2 zoning; whereas the special use permit pertained to the onsite consumption of alcohol.]
There were no further questions, and the committee voted 5-0 to approve the Class A license application.
The committee then moved on to the Class B license which pertained to the onsite consumption of alcohol.
Alderperson Smith went back to his previous question and expressed his unfamiliarity with paint and sip and wondered if they would control the number of drinks patrons were served as was the practice in a particular business in his district.
Alderperson Van Zeeland expressed discomfort with that type of question because the committee does not typically ask those questions of liquor license applicants. She thought maybe they should ask the attorney’s office for clarification on where they should go with this.
The attorney said that she had already somewhat addressed this earlier. The list she had given were the reasons the courts had considered reasonable when denying a request for a liquor license. Essentially, if the committee wanted to deny an application, their job was to come up for reasons for the denial that fit within those categories of acceptable reasons for denial. They had to create a fact pattern that lead down the road of denial for one of those reasons.
Alderperson Smith pointed out that he was not asking this question in order to deny.
Alderperson Van Zeeland thought that his question could be answered by asking the Police Chief about enforcement.
Alderperson Smith said that was not his intent and asked her to hear him out. “I’m not asking for reasons to deny; I’m trying to understand the business. That’s all I’m asking.”
Alderperson Van Zeeland responded, “I don’t know that that is our job here. Our job here is to approve the license or deny the license. We don’t ask other people who have come before us what their establishment is doing or how many drinks they’re allowing their patrons. You know, that’s—what we’re considering here is can the police department handle enforcing the rules as we see them, including that in order to sell liquor in that establishment, you know, they need to be engaged in an arts and craft.”
Alderperson Smith reiterated, “I’m just trying to understand what a paint and sip is. That’s all I’m asking.”
Alderperson Van Zeeland asked Police Chief Thomas to comment.
Chief Thomas said that “the police department has no issues and no concerns with being able to provide police services to this businesses or—we do not feel this could impact the neighborhood in a negative way at all.” Similar businesses have sprung up across the city. As previously mentioned, this business would be in a residential area but there is plenty of parking, there are thoroughfares, there is walking to and from the business, so “we do not expect to have any issues at all with this.”
Alderperson Van Zeeland asked if the establishment was not limited alcohol consumption to those engaging in arts and crafts, was that something the police department has handled before and did they have a plan to tackle it if there was a complaint?
Chief Thomas said that it would generally be complaint driven. The city has a lot of liquor establishments in the city, and they do random checks mainly of the larger businesses. Regarding smaller establishments, they would generally respond based on complaints.
Alderperson Hartzheim (District 13) had a question regarding section 13b of the Class B license application. She wanted to confirm that if they approved this application they would be stating that they will not allow outdoor service of alcoholic beverages.
Clerk Kami Lynch confirmed that that was correct. This Class B license was consistent with the special use permit which did not include outdoor seating.
Alderperson Hartzheim thanked her and said that she wanted to clarify that because an initial concern raised by Alderperson William Siebers (District 1) had been that there would be outdoor service of beverages that would potentially degrade the neighborhood. She said that she spoke with him after the City Plan Commission meeting, and he had told her that, after the clarification and discussion at that meeting, he did not feel, at this point, any need to deny this. (Although she noted she could not speak definitively for him.)
Alderperson Van Zeeland reminded everyone that part of the special use permit process entails notifying the neighborhood that a business is looking to get established in that neighborhood. She noted that they had people speak in favor of the business but she hadn’t see anyone who opposed it, and she thought that Alderperson Siebers’ absence at the Safety and Licensing Committee meeting stated a lot.
[As I noted above, there was one community member who appeared at the public hearing regarding this. He did not live in the neighborhood, but he owned property next to the building this business would be housed in. While he did not outright oppose it, he had questions and concerns and I viewed his feelings toward it as leaning more to the negative.]
Alderperson Alex Schultz (District 9) wanted to make a couple comments for the benefit of the applicant and those spoke in favor of this. For context, the Safety and Licensing Committee typically hears complaints arising between businesses that sell alcohol and nearby residential home-owners which was why the committee had taken time to flesh things out more. There have been some instances where businesses which have been granted liquor licenses have created issues in their neighborhoods for residents. He wanted to make sure that the members of the public in attendance understood that that was where the committee’s scrutiny was coming from. There was nothing against this particular business’s intentions or plans.
He went on to note that, although they had past experiences that caused concern, they had other positive reference points in the community. There are other arts related businesses in the city. He mentioned The Draw which had held events that served alcohol, and he had never heard of any kind of issues with the way they combined art and alcohol. He was appreciative of everyone who came out that evening to speak in favor of this business. He just wanted to make sure they all understood why this application process had been a little bit longer of a process, and he appreciated their patience and their showing up in support of what was happening in the community.
Alderperson Matt Reed (District 8 ) agreed with what Alderperson Schultz said and specifically thanked Timasha for attending the meeting. He noted that the committee often deals with issues where the owner or the interested party is not present and it does make it more difficult to get a clearer picture of things, so he thanked her for coming out and clarifying things.
Alderperson Smith wanted to make sure that it was understood that if it sounded like he was asking questions for the purpose of denying the application, that was not his intent. If it was taken that way, he apologized. He apologized if they were not allowed to ask questions about the business when they were considering a license application; he had thought they were. He had not been trying to find a way to deny the application and was just trying to understand the business better and compare it to what he knew.
[I do understand the need for keeping the discussion and questions on track, but I don’t think his overall desire to gain a better understanding of how the business was going to work was inappropriate.]
Alderperson Van Zeeland also thanked everyone and for the discussion that the committee had had.
The committee then voted 5-0 to approve the Class B license, and the members of the public clapped.
View full meeting details and video here: https://cityofappleton.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=896498&GUID=E818F0A6-EB51-438F-BF5F-5B21753EFFD7
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