The Safety and Licensing Committee met 07/13/2022. After dispensing with the taxicab driver’s license application for Torrey, the committee moved onto the remaining action items many of which were alcohol licenses of one sort or another, and many of those were temporary licenses related to Mile of Music.
Alderperson Sheri Hartzheim (District 13) made a motion to approve the balance of the agenda, and then the committee members proceeded to ask questions about various applications.
On 09/10/2022, the 10th Frame was planning to hold a party celebrating 20 years of doing business.
The event included a large tent in their parking lot and the outdoor sale of alcohol. Erb Street separated the 10th Frame building from its parking lot. During the event, Erb Street was going to be closed off to facilitate travel between the parking lot and the building.
Alderperson Hartzheim asked how the closure of the street would be managed with alcohol potentially being on the street during the event.
City Clerk Kami Lynch answered that the event organizers were going to get a street occupancy permit from the Department of Public Works so that the street would be adequately barricaded off. The premise amendment that was before the Safety and Licensing Committee was to allow people to go from the building across the street into the parking lot where the bulk of the activities, music, and food would be. The premise amendment allowed alcohol to be consumed on the street, but it was mainly to facilitate the transport of alcohol to the parking lot. City staff had opted to have the business get a street occupancy permit and a premise amendment versus permitting it like a special event because the majority of the event was occurring on private property.
Alderperson Hartzheim asked if the plan was for the entire area to be barricaded and not just the street so that there was an enclosure for where alcohol could be consumed.
Clerk Lynch answered that they had discussed signage but not necessarily barriers. The signs would be “No Alcohol Beyond This Point” signs that would let attendees know that they should stay in the confines of the parking lot. There would be no specific fencing in the parking lot area.
Alderperson Hartzheim also had questions regarding the premise amendment for the Trout Museum of Art’s art exhibit opening on 08/26/2022. They planned to have outside bar service on their property. Even though there would be no programming on Houdini Plaza, guest would potentially spill onto Houdini Plaza with alcoholic beverages so the museum wanted to add the plaza as a premise amendment.
Alderperson Hartzheim asked if the city would have any sort of liability if there was an issue with the people who spilled over into Houdini Plaza. Were there concerns that the city should have?
Clerk Lynch said similar events and situations had happened before. The premise amendment was really just to cover them by licensing the part of the area where people might spill over. The intention was not to have people standing on the fountain or anything like that.
Alderperson Hartzheim wondered what area of the plaza the premise amendment would cover because no map or diagram had been provided. Clerk Lynch checked the application and said the area wasn’t defined. The Trout had not rented the entire plaza for the event. It was just to cover “spillover” for their art exhibit opening.
Alderperson Hartzheim asked Police Chief Todd Thomas if this had been done before and there had been no issues in the past. He confirmed that was the case.
Alderperson Alex Schultz (District 9) noted that a lot of the applications were for events around Mile of Music. He asked Chief Thomas if any of the applicants for liquor licenses had caused issues in the past during Mile of Music. Where there particular things that the committee needed to be concerned about regarding the Mile of Music events, or had these establishments been non-issues as far as enforcement and violations in the past?
Chief Thomas looked through the list of applicants and said the Police Department had never had any issues with any of them.
The committee members had no further questions and approved all of the license applications by a 4-0 vote.
View full meeting details and video here: https://cityofappleton.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=965304&GUID=6940F780-7745-4922-B66A-CD5C997B88D9
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