No need for referendums here

Called City Council Meeting
Oconee Living section
Athens Banner-Herald
June 26, 2006


Residents show support for Council approval of beer and wine sales

By Daniel J. Matthews, Jr.
Correspondent
Athens Banner-Herald


35 residents of Oconee County, many in favor of the council voting for approval of beer and wine sales without a referendum, came to the Watkinsville Community Center on a wet Monday evening for a special called meeting of the city council concerning the possible sales of beer and wine in restaurants and stores inside the city limits.

Currently beer and wine sales are legal in Oconee County stores only outside of municipalities, having passed in 1987 without a referendum as well.
Watkinsville mayor Jim Luken made sure everyone who attended his meeting called for Monday night were aware this special called meeting had no agenda and no vote.
“This was an information gathering meeting,” said Jim Luken. “Nobody was trying to sneak anything past you. We are not voting on anything this evening. We want input from everybody. That is why we scheduled this called meeting.”
Luken also asked for the audience to be certain to understand the distinction between distilled spirits and beer and wine. The Georgia code defines beer as malt beverages containing not more than 6 percent alcohol by volume, and wine can not be more than 21 percent.”
Members of the council voiced their opinions early on in the hour-long discussion. Nine members of the audience spoke in favor of the council voting on the approval of beer and wine without a referendum, one spoke in favor of a referendum (Phillip Stancil), and two spoke against it entirely (Jerry Studdard and Bob Bishop). Many members of the local hospitality industry spoke in favor of the vote for approval, including representatives of Maison Bleu and Gautreau’s Cajun Café.
“I need a beer,” quipped Stancil during his speech.
Currently Watkinsville restaurant patrons may bring in their own bottle for consumption without any regulation. Police Chief Lee O’Dillon and Chamber of Commerce President Charles Grimes both spoke in favor of the city of Watkinsville’s plans for possible beer and wine regulation.
“I’d just like to say for the record that the Oconee County Chamber of Commerce supports the city of Watkinsville’s effort at regulating beer and wine sales within the city limits,” said Grimes.
Members John Walsh, Jr. and Samantha Purcell introduced the measure at the end of the last city council meeting. Council member Mike Link seemed to be in favor of a referendum, although Purcell refuted the necessity of having one.
A handout from the Georgia Municipal Association spells out why the city may indeed be prohibited from having a referendum on the sale of beer and wine.
“Some have wondered whether local governments may conduct referenda on whether or not to permit the sale of beer and wine either in package sales or sales by the drink. Because the Georgia Code contemplates the holding of referenda in order to determine whether package sales of sales by the drink of distilled spirits may be allowed, such referenda on beer and wine are, by implication, not permissible.”
“This principle of statutory interpretation is known in Georgia courts as expressio unius est exclusio alterius (the expression of one thing is the exclusion of another). In addition to this is non-delegation doctrine. The doctrine essentially prohibits city governing authorities from delegating to the voters a duty that has been assign to them, in this instance determining whether sales of beer and wine should be permitted.”