The City of Danville is considering allowing the carrying of alcoholic beverages in areas along the proposed downtown riverfront.
”If you go around to historic downtown neighborhoods there are a lot – not just in river fronts, but just in a historic part of their downtown (that) will allow the carrying,” says Corporation Counsel Dave Wesner. ”It’s not city-wide, it’s bounded in certain ways to limit the idea of this. But again, we all know Summer Sounds – that kind of is what happens. And we allow that because it’s contained during that event right within the event itself – or for Culture Shock.”
Another change being considered would apparently block a local package liquor store from moving to the site of the former Gulick Illiana Health Care site along North Vermilion Street. Alderman Sharon McMahon says ‘’that’s kind of not fair’’ since the sale of the property on North Vermilion and zoning have been pending. But the proposed zoning change for part of the Gulick property was earlier withdrawn, and is now being brought back.
Danville Corporation Counsel Dave Wesner denies the change is specifically intended to stop Stroud Liquors from moving to the Gulick site. ‘’ When we looked at this it was not specific to anything. It was more of a review of what seems to make the most sense for the location of these kind of businesses,’’ said Wesner. ‘’And this is for the future down the road – as these things happen – do we want them 500 feet away from a school, or do you want them 100 feet away from a church? And again this is only Class P. It doesn’t affect any other class. And that’s just driven by the nature of the Class P business.’’
Mayor Scott Eisenhauer says there have been requests for other changes in the city’s liquor ordinances. ‘’Some have asked us to consider changing the distance rather from property line to property line to building to building. For example it talks about a thousand feet within a church or a school, well that’s the church or school property line – just as it would be the business’s property line. The reason why we don’t want to come off of that is because with the addition of a beer garden capability now, with the ability for someone to build on an addition – what we don’t want to do is lock ourselves into building the building and you’re 100 feet away from a school and now you decide you want a beer garden, so you go out and add on that beer garden – well now, technically, you’re no longer outside of that 100 feet,’’ said Mayor Eisenhauer.
The City Council is expected to vote on the proposed changes next week. They were approved by the City Council’s Public Services Committee Tuesday night.
