i please please be seated i want to begin before we get started i want to get each of you could look at your electronic device and make sure on the back that you have the correct one with your name on it somebody may have the by mistake the wrong one so if you could double check that would be great hy we're doing that please stand for the pledge of allegiance ok are we all sat any problems all right so let's get to business few preliminaries admitting to the floor in the town meeting in addition to the individual specifically have the record assistant police chief james mcgaha say and with that i don't know if there are any newly elected or reelected town meeting members who were not able to be here of massachusetts in the bylaws of the town of belmont and you impartially perform the duties as a town meeting member a position to which you have been duly elected keeping uppermost in your mind what is best for belmont and its inhabitants if you agree to say yes i will write thank you bulletin board in the town hall and at least five other places in town giving notice that the annual town meeting had not been completed and had been adjourned to meet tonight again wednesday may three two thousand and seventeen at the belmont high school at seven pm and briefly stating the business to be acted upon on accordance with the representative town meeting acts of one nine hundred twenty six as amended and section three zero dash one one zero c of our general bylaws of the town of belmont thank you ron i want to read into the record the vote on article five neglected to mention that we were rushing to get out on monday night so the vote was one eighty six in favor forty six opposed which is more than two thirds one comment is hard to get started on article ten i've had many many requests from town meeting members for non town meeting members to be invited to town meeting to comment on article ten when we take it up either monday or wednesday i've said i've decided and they have said to those that i've declined all of those requests for two or three reasons one it would be unfair to the town meeting two hundred eighty eight people ran for down meeting it's a representative down meeting you're elected the debate will likely take are plenty of points of view and w take some considerable time it would not be fair to town meeting members to have thirty or forty non town meeting members come in and give speeches secondly it would be impossible for me to choose among all those requests and wouldn't be fair to anybody quoting me by the way and so i not in a position to do that finally just a point it's this is a representative town meeting not an open county open down meaning anybody can come and speak you are elected you represent your constituents so you can in your speeches in the five minutes you can reflect what the constant you can situates want you to say or not you can tell the story if they have one you can read from a letter or whatever you want to do in the five minutes but you're representing them so i w explain why i've decided to take the course i've had i think it's the only fair way and frankly it will it will make it not easy but easier to try to have a decent discussion on article the process tonight we're going to open the meeting the annual meeting but just briefly until seven thirty we'll take a recess in the end you're meeting at seven thirty and go to the special town meeting consider articles one t then we'll recess when that day ends or adjourn the special town meeting go back to the annual town meeting for article six and seven we made just begin article six here on the and go town meeting before seven thirty or so with that mr williams jim williams chairman of the board of selectmen thank you mr moderator through you move to that article one be taken from the table all those in favor please say i was opposed  we have one report under article one you mr moderator my name is bill vol i am chair of the high school building committee here to give your brief update of the project in february two thousand and sixteen town meeting voted to establish a building committee to work with the m p to provide a solution to the high school after the state invited to their grant program the m s b is the massachusetts school building authority a quasi independent state department that assists districts in funding school renovations additions and new construction and they're funded by a portion of state sales tax on april fourth two thousand and two thousand and sixteen the building committee composed of fifteen members consisting of residents and town employees met for the first time and began to work with the m s b a on their first phase of the project called module one eligibility the full must be a program has eight modules going through political redesign final design construction and project close up we concluded module one in november two thousand and sixteen within the time allotted by the m s b accomplishing three main tasks needed to move the project along to the feasibility stage those three main tas were to form the building committee fund the feasibility phase which was accomplished at the may town meeting last year and complete the educational profile the educational profile led to several discussions on district and roman issues and out of that proposed three configurations for further study to determine the best solution for the belmont high school to summarize those three configurations are a nine through twelve school and accepted into the feasibility stage of the project and this phase must be completed within thirty months and we also negotiated agreement signed to fun slightly less than forty percent of the eligible costs including the study costs that were occurring right now this phase includes module two through module five including forming the project team the feasibility study the schematic this sign and the project funding and agreement along the way there are several miles stones or that require m s p a review and approval given that we are partners in this project with them last month we presented our selection of the owner's project manager to the m s b as data links data list projects of boston and the m s p except that our selection that is our first half of the professional team that work with and the other half is the designer which is the architect and their consultants we publish the r f s document today and more than twenty five incurious were probably place for that document already although not all of them are architectural firms that will submit for boma this process of selecting a designer is largely dictated by the m s b as guidelines to be in compliance with massachusetts laws for public work ehrman the designer selection process will have a walk through of the current high school on monday and submissions are due later this month a belmont contingent will meet with the m s p eight to rank the firms and likely invite a short list of respondents to the m s b a interview session to finalize the design or the m s p a has scheduled that process to conclude in early july of this year with a design team in place the building committee will then start feasibility design phase of the project which will include multiple iterations of designs for each configuration that must be evaluated for educational pro create us cost and impact on the current site while maintaining the current program of the high school functioning safely and effectively the anticipated schedule for the first part of the feasibility study is to be near completion about this time next year complete means that we have evaluated the multiple solutions and narrowed down to one option that belmont finds most appropriate and which we present to the m s b a for the review and approval following m s p a approval we will be able to move into a schematic design where the preferred option is designed in more detail priced in more detail construction logistics developed in more detail all to create a well defined project and funding agreement that meets the m s b a standards with that in place of funding process will be defined which must be approved by the end of that thirty month period i mentioned earlier and which expires in the spring of two thousand and nineteen the building committee expects that we will meet this schedule we had our first belmont community forum last month with a fantastic turnout not just in numbers but also in comments questions and ideas we will continue to those meetings more frequently because this project is a belmont project and as such will only be successful with all of belmont communities input the building committee has a website that is link to the town website and i encourage you to visit that site where you will find all the material the committee reviews and develops schedules meeting minutes six of the warrant for this town meeting there's a board of selectmen have a vote on this motion allison we have about four minutes once you begin and then yes then we will recess two to forty eight in belmont this poses many complex issues legal planning public safety the state has been somewhat behind where we hoped it would be in providing guidance the planning board believes it to be in the best interests of the town to have a one year moratorium that will allow us to thoughtfully consider these issues hold ample public  deal with whatever state structure and instructions emerge from our detail and that i'd like to ask the moderator council to provide a town meeting members with more background and detail good evening george hall town council as mr allison said we had a favorable vote state why don't question for a november which sets puts in place a regulatory process for the legal sale of marijuana for non medical purposes the state having already adopted a statute for medical marijuana sales that the timeline for that originally called for licenses to be issued by a newly created cannabis control commission by january first of twenty eighteen just after the first of this year pushed that back to six months to july first of twenty eighteen in the meantime there's a great deal of confusion over one of the sections of the new statutes dealing with local control and in particular the the process by which towns cities and towns may choose to opt out of allowing one or more of the different types of marijuana establishment  the legislature has established a joint committee on marijuana policy they've had four hearings the last one of which was last monday they are considering over fifty amendments to the bill ranging in every everything dealing with the amount of the excise tax that would be imposed to the composition of the cannabis control commission but crucially dealing with the the the question of how towns can choose to opt out and there are some competing bills pending before the legislature they've announced an intention to get something passed by this summer we'll see if they do that but in the meantime i've been asked by towns i represent what's up what's  prudent way that we can kind of play and and have enough time to see how the state regulations materialize on this and many towns are adopting the zoning moratoria that  on the same schedule that the state has outlined for the state regulations thank you mr hall at this point we will recess the end you are meeting and then when we resume  the special town meeting will come back to open up to town meeting members for discussion of article six now call the special town meeting of may third two thousand and seventeen for the  belmont to order i was made to the floor in addition to all the other individuals to monday and today aaron louvin who is a member of this economic advisory committee the rules i've pursuant to the warrant for the special town meeting to be held today may three two thousand and seventeen i own o'brian cushman town clerk do hereby certify that i gave notice of said meeting by posting in a tested copy of the warrant on the town clerk's official bulletin board at the town hall and at least five other places in town fourteen days before the date of this meeting in accordance with chapter thirty nine section ten of the general laws and section three zero dash one one zero eight of the belmont bio's of the town of belmont furthermore i do hereby certify that i gave notice of the special town meeting of may third two thousand and seventeen by causing a copy of that warrant to be sent to town meeting members at least fourteen days before the date of this meeting and by causing copies of the warrant to be made available at the public library and at the town clerk's office all in accordance with section three zero dash one one zero b of the general bylaws of the town of belmont and the representative town meeting acts of  amended thank you on let me explain what we're going to do and in special town meeting we have of course only two articles and they're very much linked so the process will be as follows mr bowen read the motion under article one and we'll get the votes and then make a presentation we'll then hear from miss amendment and then we will discuss the amendment once we dispense with that we then go back to the main motion either as amended or not and then we proceed to article t however we will discuss both articles one and two together because they are very closely linked of course so we'll discuss them together under the motion under article one so if you have any question about that of course raise it during during the discussion but i think that will make it simpler all around and we laid out the presentations in that that once we dispense with article one one hopes that there might not be much further discussion on article two and i think that will expedite matters finally in the matter of scope obviously we will discuss individual discuss how we got here and why these are on the warrant however it is not appropriate or within scope to read litigating if you will votes of the board selectmen prior votes on transfers and obviously we know the number one issue that caused a lot of dismay and so forth the loading dock question so we're not go bush article one mood that are in your article one the reading of the proposed petition to the general court be dispensed with the same being set forth in full under article one of the warrant for this meeting and have it previously distribute each term meaning member enact legislation to limit the transfer of licenses for the sale of alcoholic beverages not to be drunk on the premises substantially as set forth in oracle one of the ward for this town meeting that the selectmen be authorized for approving minutes of the bill before it next week by the general court but the reason for this these are two articles that are sponsored by the board of selectmen and it has to do with transferability versus non transfer billet just in general for those of you who may not know what to think we may have had some hand outs tonight we currently have six retail licenses which means that riccio sales of alcohol we have two full retail for alcohol licenses and we have for one in beer that means retail sale of alcohol not to be drunk on the premises we also have twenty six restaurant licenses are what i refer to misquoting licenses we have issued thirteen and we have thirteen available to issue ten of those are all alcohol and sixteen of those are one in beer the should force ladies and gentlemen tonight is the new interest ability and i'm just going to just talk about this in general terms you can see the two thousand and fourteen act there the place senses which we first adopted as a community back in one thousand nine hundred seven never had nine transferability associate so share with them at all so none of the poor licenses today all twenty six are transferable they have no restriction on transferability but one adopted back in two thousand and six  an ability to issue within our community retail sale of alcohol one full alcohol and two wanted to be here during that time in two thousand and six we had a provision within that home rule petition that  you on the slides up coming here that they would not be transferred at all that if someone were to sell the business or leave the business they would those licenses will be come back to the community what happened subsequent to that and there are other things that occurred as well we increased the number of poor licenses over time but in two thousand and thirteen we as a body met to approve an expansion of the retail licenses to two full alcoholics full retail alcohol licenses so we went from one to two one full out for alcohol and we went from two to four on one in beer so in total we have six as i indicated during that time in two thousand and thirteen and as you can see here in the two thousand and fourteen home rule protection for whatever reason in leigh's in germany it was just an oversight it was an oversight by the board of selectmen it was an oversight by its own administrators office it was an oversight perhaps by this body and fact that it was not there at the time i was on the board i believe that we were simply just expanding the number of retail licenses that we had in place didn't know and understand at the time that were in fact we were doing is creating a situation in which based on town council opinion all we chill licenses today are transferable because the two thousand and six if you read the law here that's in front of you if you thousand and fourteen whom will petition in fact talks about all so according to town council his his opinion to us in his speech would as well that create a situation which all of the retail licenses are in fact transferable so the more select mean when i know we're not talking about you know what's taken place over the past year we felt that the intent to at least myself and others on the board felt he turned to the retail at the time in two thousand and six and i believe today should be that the nontransferable that they come back to the licensing board the board of selectmen and then we granted again either in a sale  transfer or whatever me say oh a change in ownership of the location that they should come back to the licensing authority and therefore at that point we would decide based on the application where the through gritted again to a new applicant now the porn licenses the restaurant licenses as i've mentioned never had no interest or ability within them the board of selectmen feel as though that those also should have not transferability provisions the marketability of the poor license clearly as you can understand as a as they indicated there's really no market for them there are thirteen that have been issued thirteen available so frankly if someone decided that had a poor likes if they wanted to sell that poorly license is likely no more credibility to that because they could simply just come to the licensing board to be granted a license i believe a price elfin perhaps on the call my colleagues on the board of former colleagues in the board believe that these licenses were nothing more than they were granting a business inability to sell alcohol that they were getting a business inability to improve the economic vitality of a particular neighborhood clearly enhances the value of that business but i never felt and i believe this body never felt or his history would speak to this point and that is they never intended to be an economic windfall to the licensee it never intended to be used as collateral they never intended to be sold they were simply tended to provide a license to a business either retail or restaurant so that they could preserve a hall and hits economic vitality of neighborhoods we're in a situation today ladies and gentlemen which they are all transferable i believe strongly that they should resort back to being non trance for a bowl and not restrictive in any way i mean i think certainly the licensing board has created licenses to any number of businesses the town will continue to do that but we believe that the town should control who gets those licenses and again we don't believe that they i believe they should be assets of the business that have been granted it so that's the current law into the other fourteen it's going to next slide you can see the change what the change will will allow for is that the retail licenses and the article one will now be nontransferable understand lesion gentleman that they're not transfer they are transferable today we believe that if this body votes to support these articles that we would then need to go to the legislature to have them approve the home rule petition we have in fact asked both set of the browns berger and representative rogers we've shared with them the language of these articles and they have socialized that within their respective bodies no vote has been taken likely going to be committee action and then a full vote of the legislature we are not guaranteed ladies and gentlemen if we in fact support so again as i indicated this is just a recap of what i talked about i can certainly go through the names of the businesses that hold these licenses i don't think that's relevant if i'm at the question i'm prepared to answer it we've issued to all alcohol and we've  one in beer retail licenses next like one these are the restaurant licenses this is the current statute as it stands today from two thousand and ten again as you see the law here there's no non transfer ability research restrictions within this home rule petition if you go to the next like when you see the highlights and read ever create new entries for billet e of the poor licenses i'll just stop there because you might ask and perhaps you will ask is that why we involved in the restaurant licenses well i believe we just need to simplify matters and create consistency so that all our licenses be they either retail or restaurant pouri licenses should have had non transferability that's how the board felt and we did vote as you and as i indicated three to zero nontransferable and then finally in the next slide on the poor he my senses you can see that the all alcohol restaurant licenses with more than sixty seats we have issued for there are available six in on the wine and beer restaurant restaurant with more than thirty nine seats we have issued nine and have available seven so we have plenty of poor licenses for those businesses that want to work in some way participate in this benefit i'm going to turn it over to counsel george hall i mean apologize if we believe this is somewhat tedious but i think is important just to understand the history of where we were and we were and i provided some of that already but george you can go through just really briefly to some of the home was a town in which you know well sales were allowed at all until one thousand nine hundred seven and unlike many other towns belmont never accepted after one thirty eight of the general laws to to you know import wholesale the regulatory process for alcohol sales that applies in much of the rest of the state the law here is entirely governed by a series of home rule petitions that have been adopted and that's the list of them i've color coded them because  the three at the bottom which are the most recent are the ones that are just discussed that pertain to retail sales and restaurants beer and wine restaurants and all alcohol in the ones in those that have the same color that are higher up the list are just the earlier iterations of those things so what we're doing is amending those last three all of which some of which refer back to  previous legislation that's highlighted on that list apart from that i don't think i'll go through the detail lest people have questions about it but again just just to understand that all alcohol licensing in belmont has been done in this fashion by this body asking for special rules to be adopted by the legislature and so to change those rules you have to petition the legislature again to amend those earlier establishments in fact would even consider at some point expanding but i would believe that they should be in any way other than just a license i don't believe that they should be an asset that security only enhances the value of business that they could barter exchange or pledge and i think rid limit transfer of retail liquor licenses i move to amend article one by deleting from the proposed section two way of chapter sixteen of the acts of twenty fourteen the phrase quote to any other location or unquote and by inserting at the end of the phrase quote for use at any other location unquote so that the proposed section two way would read as follows way the licensing authority of the town of belmont shall not approve the transfer of a license granted under this act or under the chapters three ninety five or three ninety six of the acts of two thousand and six to any other person partnership corporation l l c organization or any other entity for use at any other location let me get the vote one moment the votes first from the board let me correct what i said before our votes on the original article were in a favorable action by a vote of ninety one in each case separately we voted on the amended on the amendments just presented and the your vote was favorable action by eleven zero actions and one abstaining in each case all right so eleven zero one in full disclosure i initially signed the petition that selectman dashon former selectman jones initiated to the a b c c because i believe that town meeting had assured had been assured when these three licenses were added that they were identical to the first licenses approved in two thousand and six however i offer these amendments now because i believe that for belmont to create a more thriving economic environment without sacrificing the livability and small town feel of belmont that we need to adapt to the world of the twenty first century notably yesterday i received an e mail from a small business in town who supported these amendments as a great compromise he had originally been against liquor license transfer ability yet he felt this compromise measure crafted with the help of town council was very agreeable as a dedicated member of the the economic development advisory committee aaron luby and has worked tirelessly with town officials in town council to come up with these amendments i urge you to carefully consider the issues we lay out in this presentation in light of increasing the business and therefore tax base of the town while preserving the town character we prize  am here to discuss the liquor licensing issue because when the articles were put in place i recognized the fact that it was an all or nothing kind of thinking and that kind of thinking does not belong in a town that should valving over time so i started doing research and thanks to missiles and a group of others i met with various factors and parties around the town to identify and assess what the real need for liquor licensing is it's a complex situation and i think that mark and mr plough and mr hall have done a great job of explaining it but i kind of tend to go a little on the more elementary side of things so if you wouldn't mind i'm just going to take a few minutes to walk you through my thinking intent when we in one nine hundred ninety seven and what is laid out in the rules and regulations on months website for a liquor license saying essentially provide the way for diversifying our economics for in being able to enjoy a vibrant and vital environment with healthy business centers and corridors also we want to enhance our community and we do this by offering liquor licenses that then provide us improved tax base and a controlled revenue stream of get to that in just a minute we have unique and healthy businesses that make them on a destination not only for visitors to town our visitors and guests but also us so that we keep our money in town and they provide gathering places for other opportunities i've never been to a charitable event where they didn't serve me beer or wine or liquor so this mark mr plough has already run through as well as mr hall put it in a different format but essentially you know that we have no more retail licenses than there are half the restaurant licenses still available there's a process that each business owner goes through that hasn't been discussed nor has been shared that i think is important for each of you to know whether you're a business owner or not when you're in new business or when you're trained or when your a licensee or a potential latency you have to go through a process that's pretty laborous and pretty burdened some comfort some and really it's the business that wants to provide the service to us who goes through this lengthy process there are over ten lengthy reports that they have to provide to the town to the a b c see which the liquor licen at the state level they pay a five hundred dollars fee to the town they pay a two hundred dollars fee to the a b c see in some of those documents and include financial structure and financial reports business structure proof order and approved and i said to maybe appreciate it then the business can then open and operate then around november first thirty days before december first they have to  apply for their intent to renew their liquor license that includes a charge of twenty six hundred dollars for beer and wine licenses and forty one hundred dollars for all alcohol licenses then comes the can then come the inspections they open their business to the board of health to look at health code violations they'd look at the fire department to make sure that the business look up to code this is very different from any other business involvement as we saw in recent recent fires then the treasure and the police department opined upon how many calls have been made about this business whether it's too noisy or whatever and whether they've paid their bills then when everything is in good standing every single year and they pay that fee then they can continue to operate the reason why transfer ability is important to belmont and especially to our business is it is because it allows our businesses to exit their business in a time of need and also in a safe way where they're handing off their business either to somebody who has the same intent as them to offer the same kind of services maybe selling food and you know selling beer and wine or a restaurant a lovely restaurant that we all bring our families to this is kind of an overview of ways that businesses find themselves needing a bit of change whether they're expanding or shrinking they have to decide if they're going to move or sell also there are instances where landlords are not necessarily business friendly or restaurant friendly and that restaurant may want to move a couple doors down the street to a better landmark and let's not forget that most of our business owners here in belmont have been here for a long time can you imagine just turning over the liquor and the liquor the beer wine and liquor license to a new buyer without the benefit of that buyer buying their liquor license with the entire business so that brings us to a quick overview of alcohol licenses this th irty thousand foot view or as i like to call alcoholic senses for dummies let me explain what are the motions what the motions of the board of selectmen intend to do is unintentionally undermining the business friendliness of belmont by restricting liquor licenses for not being transferred you're essentially reducing the cost and the price of a transaction what our emotions or our articles in amendments intend to do is to provide a way in belmont to encourage the right kind of transfer ability and maybe not allow the transfer ability that we don't appreciate what i found in my research i was talking to people of all ages generations neighborhoods business owners restauranteurs people who eat food bees and those who run into convenience stores and star market is that people are pretty ok and pretty and ok with the transfer of a license from a business owner to another business to somebody who's buying the business and the liquor license comes right with it when we look at somebody moving to a new location for the instances i mentioned people are generally pretty ok with that too we don't want to handcuff our businesses and have them go back to the board of selectmen through the whole application process they should be able to move their business from one store from one location to another but they're expanding or shrinking or they have limited issues of parking or flooding whatever but really i think is where the rubber hits the meets the road is when a business owner in a location sells a liquor license or a beer and wine license to somebody who wants to open a restaurant or retail establishment in another location this is i think the way that we've written the amendment it's a subtle change to the articles that were written by the board of selectmen but it's one that allows for the transfer of person a person and location to location and what we do is we have actively create economic balance in town which is what we really want right so i hope you understand that the subtlety in the amendment language allows activities that are that our residents approve and precludes at the activities that we don't want to occur amendments the warrant committee voted eleven favorable no objection and one abstaining so the vote was a favorable vote for the amendment yes ok i just wanted to clarify that because i was confused  joe johns town meeting member precinct two i rise to seating to oppose the amendments proposed by my friend of long years forty years at least she was very young  you were two ok and i also rise to oppose the amendments that are endorsed almost unanimously by my former colleagues on the war committee this is not the first time the war committee and i have disagreed although in this particular case i did not have a chance to present anything to them in terms of the arguments that i have against the amendments so we'll see how the evening goes i think it's really time to simplified the discussion and i think aaron did a good job of getting this back down to basics the subject of liquor licensing is complex the amendments are complex so let's just focus on some basic themes here since the days when belmont first decided to issue licenses to sell alcoholic beverages there has been one consistent philosophical scheme is a theme as far as i'm concerned a license is a permit to operate a specific business a restaurant or  retail store it may be renewed but it is no longer wanted or needed it returns to the town why is this because the town has an interest in location ownership and other matters particularly when it comes to the sale of alcohol so proponents of these amendments have introduced a different concept of what a license is this concept is that a liquor license is an economic asset that can be bought and sold this was raised first in two thousand and fifteen and then it was used in two thousand and sixteen to justify the sale of the old liquor retail license to star market the purpose of the articles proposed by the selectmen is to return to the policy that i think that sound always had and that is that licenses are not economic assets former selectman that i have talked with and that includes almost all of them agree that the long standing intent of the town has been that this licenses for the sale about the whole should not be bought and sold the selection draft of the articles for the special town meeting to avoid a recurrence of the events of two thousand and sixteen it basically said that we want clarify our intention regarding these licenses and we wanted to make sure we had clear legal language and the policy established by the articles is very simple no transfer of licenses period when there's no transfer of licenses there's no economic value to those licenses that brings me to the amendments the amends to say that the transfers are not allowed for use at any other location and that's a very interesting way of saying it transfers are allowed in some other cases and i think that we've already heard the types of exceptions allowed by the environment and i don't want to go through them because it might just take all of my time to do that important concept is this at a basic core the amendments retain the concept that liquor licenses or economic assets is libyan discussed buying a restaurant and buying its license it simply limits the types of transfers or sales that are allowable when you allow any transfers you allow the conditions under which alcohol is sold to be determined by the deals made between buyers and sellers and i believe that these decisions should be made instead by an authorised town licensing authority these amendments by keeping the concept of liquor licenses as economic assets alive defeats the overall purpose of the articles in the special town meeting i realized as the proponents of these articles argue that they provide tangible businesses benefits rather to local businesses and that they are also business friendly and i believe that the warrant committee was persuaded that being business friendly was important i also realised that they were drafted to be of assistance to a specific business now making an ownership transfer the problem with making policy to help specific businesses is that larger interests are ignored in two times the purpose of it is exactly what  it was to bring the work of licenses in help the businesses and be able to i don't want to say the word choose but have the tenor of the town and keep that in mind and that's what  committee did we're the ones who set the seeding and all kinds of things one of the reasons i joined the board was i was totally against alcohol and dolma and i went full circle and i was far and i've watched it all happen but no one has mentioned money here you talk all over about business isn't the word community thinks about money when they transfer a license it's in the business they can make one hundred thousand they can make a four hundred thousand  could make five hundred thousand dollars belmont gets nothing nothing at all so sure wouldn't you want to apply for a liquor license of four thousand or two thousand dollars and then have a business and turn around and sell it why not and when you say as parents who've been sorry when you apply for a license and then they have they review it every year you have to do something horrible for them to take away your license so once you get the license you keep the license so my feeling is let's go with the original proposal that marked the low and dash of voting for because that we want to keep belmont the way it is not have people transferring licenses and letting them go all over town without some type of control thank you and mary mahoney town meeting member precinct one former member of the board of selectmen i stand in opposition to the amendments and in support of the original two articles we consider tonight belmont's bold step of moving from  hundred forty years as a dry town to one where alcohol could be served in restaurants and eventually in retail stores with wells was both historic and very well planned i served on the board of selectmen when those first licenses were actually issued and the goal was to provide a low cost license to spur new restaurant business in town later we issued retail licenses to create new and interesting businesses as well the compact we made with the voter and the town meeting was that these licenses would not be a commodity they would not be owned bought or sold by individuals or corporations they were an incentive and a means to encourage belmont to continue to grow as a diverse and attractive business destination one of our fears at the time was that we did not want to attract the corruption that sometimes accompanies the ability to sell and purchase an alcohol license we did not want to be boston or everett or chelsea we wanted to do this in belmont's own special way these licenses would be the same as those issued by the town to an antiques dealer or those issued by the state to a real estate broker a means for oversight and enforcement of standards we teach our steen ages when they qualify for a driver's license that a license is a privilege not a right it is a privilege that is not owned by the licensee and cannot be transferred i do not believe that any of our original goals for the issuances of alcohol licenses have changed today we have attracted interesting and diverse businesses that enliven our retail districts allowing these licenses to be transferred would would take the control away from the town and allow the big liquor stores you see advertised in the sunday newspapers to buy up all of the licenses and create a one dimensional monopoly it would allow one well financed restaurant tour to buy up all of the licenses and create a one dimensional dining landscape is that what we want for belmont i don't think so please join me in voting against the amendments and in favor of the main motion under the articles this evening thank mr moderator david albert tell me the member precinct six and a member of the belmont board of health the board of health has taken no position on either the articles or the amendments but there is an important piece of information that you need to know when you discuss this because there is precedence food permits in this town are not transferable if you have a license to run a food establishment in this town and you decide to sell your restaurant or food store the buyer must go through the entire process in order to take over that establishment you cannot sell these permits they are not transferable the other thing that needs to know is there was a mention for the amendment presenter that the annual process the board of health chimes in every year and any food establishment in town when they're up for their new victual is licensed in december so this is a process that exists whether you have liquor or not certainly the fee is not as large as different fees for restaurants but the fact remains if you sell food in this town you need approval from us in order to be able to get your license again for the next year that also will not change thank you very much mr moderat why i said no injuries very nice but i had more of a question particularly off topic but particularly about two things one would there be a chance that if we did allow a transfer ability that it could transfer out of the tap that was one sort of question i had about that in second it was if we transferred let's say from i don't know me from where i live in the street for a hypothetical and moved it to a different part of the town with that could there be some type of say where me the slatkin or the board could like talk member at large on the first question no absolutely not you can't transfer license outside of town it's a belmont license as far as transfer ability to another location as i understand these amendments so are so the articles presented by the board  that are not amend it would create a situation which none of these licenses would be transferred they would come back to the board as a licensing authority and then if a new application were to be filed either by the new business owner at the same location or anyone else we would then make a decision whether or not the granted as i understand these amendments what this creates is the situation in which you could use transferability as to the location there's transfer realty as to the location if there's a change in ownership at a location within we only go structure and perhaps is transferability to this by that business if that business were located to another part of town i think at that point our discretion is sort of limited in terms of whether or not we would agree at that sort of ability to have that license move through business to move to another part of town certainly is as we look at these matters we understand that we surely don't want to have a license the stablish wants within five hundred feet of a school within a religious establishment so there would be can you talk into the mike from trouble hearing about thank you i think it's important to understand that when the application for a transfer comes in the board evaluates that in much the same way as it would evaluate an initial license application as if that proposed transfer e was the applicant for an available license so they have the same discretion to determine whether that place in c is a suitable person or if it's a change of location as to whether that's all that location serves the public need the real key difference is that when you allow transfer ability it's  owner of the licenses really selecting who can apply for that license it's where is if it were to come back to the town presumably people would be on an equal footing to apply for that you might have multiple applicants for  very much appreciated thank you and i recognize mr williams and then i'll go back o jim williams chairman of the board of selectmen mr moderator i think it's important for a town meeting to understand why we don't have more licenses stuck into the microphone i think it's important for town meeting to understand why we don't have more retail licenses just as a point of information well george we would tell us why i don't know the answer but you guys are going to need more than my word on it whole george ball town council the short answer is because you didn't ask for any more the longer answer is that through across the commonwealth there is generally a quota there's a cap on the number of licenses that can be issued in cities and towns that have adopted chapter one thirty eight that's a function of population plus how many times they go to the legislature and beg for the cap to be lifted and in fact  through my research i've noticed in the last decade or so the legislature adopts somewhere on the order of thirty to thirty five bills a year addressing the quotas pleasurable in every town in belmont because it's this is not a chapter one thirty eight town the quota is basically a function of how many licenses the town asked to be authorized to grant in the rate that the town has asked for more restaurant licenses that are than are currently in demand however retail licenses only three were authorized in two thousand and six thousand at the two thousand and thirteen any will to meaning the town asked for it and subsequently received permission to raise that to six but it's a stablished by special act and so the fact that are there are no more licenses to be granted is what creates the market for  anyone who wants to operate one of those businesses has to acquire that license somehow thank you mr williams and you have i also wanted to make a statement about the selectmen vote on the articles the original articles in the statement i want to make about that is that george hall gave us options when we were considering the articles for town meeting in it  options included several other ways of looking at the situation but we decided and this was sami marc and i we decided that the best way for a town meeting to think about this was to go back to the original intent which was in two thousand and six so what you have is you have a situation where you have the two thousand and six intent and then you have what we have now which is full transfer ability and  the the real point is that it's not up to the selectmen and it's not up to the warrant committee to decide what to do it's up to the town meeting to decide to do so the decision is on your desk and you have a choice you have no transfer ability you have transfer ability if you choose to do nothing or you have this in between the in between amendments that allow for the which i'm not sure the first is if appropriate i wonder if each of the slots meant to explain their vote on the amendments and why i would just be curious to know what your thinking was in favor or against the amendment the second question that i have and i don't know who's the proper person to answer this if we allow transferability even limited that means we are thinking of these licenses more as assets than strictly licenses part of what i think caused such widespread upset earlier this year was the feller of the town to capture a significant amount of value that people felt belonged to the town and not a private citizen is there a way if we're allowing partial trans any sort of value from a private transaction and the point i think i made in my presentation is these are licenses they should not be assets we surely want to support businesses this is not a business articles they are  not we have provided a number of licenses that we feel the need to expand the number retail we will provide an oracle tone we need to consider to expand retail if we feel there's a need we want to create economic vitality you want to create quality like within the within different neighborhoods  i don't believe that these licenses should be boarded as assets that we shouldn't be in here seem business is to create a licensing arrangement where they can sell them and bar them or even pledge them it's collateral that was never the intent from ninety ninety comment when adam dash town meeting member a large i was going to bring this up after i heard from all of you lovely people so i'm happy to jump the line if i'm asked i have a lot of experience with this as you may know as an attorney in other towns handling a lot of restaurant and liquor deals and sales so i'm very familiar with how other communities deal with this and you've probably heard me talk about belmont issues in the past the amendments weaken the restrictions on the transferability of liquor licenses which we're trying to stop at least that was what i thought the intent was the words are very small it's a very big change in what the original article was trying to do which was to prevent transferability the idea was with the un amended articles was that if you wanted to sell your business or if you owned your business and you wanted to move it to a different location that you would have to give the license back to the town the town would then but put out an announcement that we have a liquor license available your buyer of your business could apply for other people in town who either want to start a business or who are existing without a liquor license and want to have one can apply they come to the board to select one will then have this full group of people to choose from including the buyer of that particular restaurant this being sold or the new location for somebody who has one and is moving and then we can make a choice based upon that we might very well choose the buyer of the business we've might not but i think it  es belmont and it's an all of our best interests to have that larger r f p if you will go out and to allow us to have a larger panel or a larger slate of applicants to choose from because what happens when you sell your business is we don't get to choose who the buyer is the seller does and so the seller bring someone to the tape able and we unless the person is totally unfit or fails the criminal record check or has some you know problem with their application we really don't have a whole lot of ability to say no we don't choose them or is this way we would have a group of people to choose from so it's not uncommon to have the restrictions and amended the original restrictions that we have plenty of communities have those i've been involved in deals and those other communities with restaurants and liquor stores they buy and sell quite fine they buy and sell for big money they get you we just have a contingency in the purchase agreement where it's contingent upon the transfer of ability the license and i would agree with dr alper about the common picture license which is the license to sell food this is just the liquor part but to do the restaurant you also have to have the food license food licenses are not transferable at all and that's been our been the law as he said so you have to always make the sale contingent upon at least the live food license being being issued because you have to come to the board of selectmen to get that food license regardless of whether these liquor licenses  transferable or not so there's always a contingency in that purchase and sale agreement to get your permits in this case instead of just the food it would be the food and the liquor if you don't get one one or the other you will not go forward with the transaction if you do get them the well it is i think it's pro business to be honest to not do the amendment because it allows all other businesses including new ones who want to have a liquor license new businesses that want to open or some who muddle along for a long time without one and now want to get one to come in front of the town and get that license rather than being restricted to that one buyer who we have no control over so i think that isn't actually pro business to not have the amendment the license and i agree with what  purpose of the licenses are to serve the public and to spur economic development if we decide that someone comes before us with a license and that area we feel has too many licenses and there's some area that could use a restaurant and use a little bit of help license to that other location if there's an applicant over there i'd like to have the choice to be able to do that our licensing regulations in this town need a lot of work this is just one piece of them but it's the one that's in front of us now i believe that these amendments tie the town's hands as i've described i don't think we can afford to do that i believe chairman william stated that the original an amended articles were designed to implement town meetings intent back when the light when the licenses were first  issued i agree with them i think that's correct the amendment water that down and that is not town meetings intent so i would like to i would urge no on the amendment yes on the main articles thank first liquor authority board meetings that we had where the owner of the or not the owner but the holder of the liquor license was able to pledge license as collateral for a loan and at the time my my question was how could that how could that be because the holder of the license didn't own the license and the license was renewed annually so it didn't make sense to me that the license could be pledged however i was assured by my colleagues sammy and mark and also by town council that this was common business practice in massachusetts and it served the purpose of in hansing business is that handled liquor licenses so since that time we've had our experience i think the practice of the board the original intent of the two thousand and six town meeting so the reason i voted for the amendments is that i feel the amendments are more pro business than no  transferability because it preserves the good will that the business owners had built up by their practice but it also prevents the transfer from one owner to to another in a new location which was the primary objection and in the past that's the reason why i voted in favor of the amendment voted in favor of it because i wanted to support small businesses and enhance our community i feel these amendments confuse the issue and i believe the intent was what the article is correcting at least that was my intent i can't speak for others in town meaning but i also am concerned that  adopting these amendments it will actually potentially lead to more problems including not supporting small businesses in town for some of the reasons people already mentioned in the sense that you could have somebody gamed the system by applying for a license being approved selling it off to somebody at a huge gain to themselves and they could sell it to anybody  including a large business that might come into town that could essentially in the long run force other small businesses out of business and so because of those reasons declaration to everybody in town meetings particularly new members of cabinet meeting regarding an earlier comment the warrant committee doesn't decide anything the war committee has and go executive authority we only exist team humble human beings trying to make sense of the same issues that you're wrestling with and we make recommendations that's our role in town secondly i have a question about the article i thought the amendment sorry i thought i understood it and i thought i heard of explain differently which is as i read the amendment it's it would allow an existing license to be convey if there was a change of ownership at a particular location but it would not allow the either the current owner or a new owner to take that license and set up operations in a different location of my mistaken about that i'm sorry the question again well as i read it as i have to say we read this somewhat hastily since the amendment was only presented on monday but the last clause as i read it certainly seemed to prohibit transfer from transfer of a license for use at any other location so it seemed to lock in existing license at a given location that it prohibits transfer to a different place and see a different person corporation a different entity if that the intention of that entity is to exercise it is a different location which i was sorry you've lost me that those of the restaurant at a given address has a license that that license can then be used to run a different restaurant someplace else george hall town council no i think ms luby and slide that shows the four quadrants you can go to a different owner at the same location it can be kept by the same owner and moved to a different location you just can't go diagonally you can't it can't go from one owner to a different owner to exercise it a different location i think that's my understanding of the purpose of the amendment and i think that's how it's phrased well my gosh that's not how i read it so no i hope i'm not the only person in the room who made that mistake but certainly by reading used any of the of the of the location i understood it to mean that the license couldn't move so ok so you can take the advice of the warren committee for what it's worth but i but may i just say it for all the discussion about this issue i think it's belmont is much better off that liquor licenses are available but then scenarios can come up because it's not just a dichotomous black and white issue situations arise and i frankly sympathized with the ralph joneses of town thinking that the transfer we're not allowed to discuss this evening was was something to be avoided in the future and the certainly the original motion achieves that purpose but then there are scenarios one can always imagine horrible scenarios but then there are much more and oculus scenarios and you have to make a judgement what's kind of more likely and when something is so stringent that a family business couldn't be re constituted as an l l c without going through a hole without losing their license effectively or a parent selling to a child or some very innocuous kinds of transfers that it's a little bit disruptive  me it would be i'm willing to live with the potential downside of the amendment because they seem kind of remote to me and i would be willing to take the chance with the amendment being it somewhat business friendly and a problem arises down the road then we could revisit this issue in the future but i would err at this point on the side of being more liberal than less liberal  a town meeting member precinct five and i see both sides of this issue i see the desire of the town to have greater can see the desire of the town to have greater control but i also see the side of the restaurant owner and to think that there's no economic value in customers in goodwill that somebody puts into building a restaurant i wish we had some people here who actually had some of these licenses so i think that i am leaning toward supporting this amendment because i believe that these people work hard i don't know how hard it is for them to get loans against their business not pledging an asset but to just get funding for their business if there's uncertainty about this license and right now that uncertainty lies in the hands of the town and and i guess i like roy and willing to provide some greater certainty to the business owner that's restaurant running a restaurant you talk to you know i think michael who runs  a tough tough business and to me i wouldn't want to you know create obstacles for people not to come to trial mind because of the fact that they could spend years building a clientele building a customer base and then not have the certainty of being able to transact that because the license has gotten economic value from the investment that that person has put into building that business thank you history you mr matter lynn breed meaning member precinct eight and also in my day job i do work in the area of licensing but not alcohol licensing and i just would like to remark that the purpose of license thing is the protection of the public and the slide that was shown in support of the amendment one of the slides laid out the extensive qualifications that the licensee has to show the licensing agency in order to obtain these licenses and including many factors related to both the holder of the license and the location where the license is going to be used and this amendment would permit person to person transfer of licenses and location to location licenses as the slide with the quadrants showed and  so consequently the amendment would greatly undercut the public protection purpose of licensing i agree that a license is a right is keeps me is a privilege and not a right it's not an asset and its primary purpose is for public protection using reasonable qualifications for licensees and therefore i stand  think they're they're particularly relevant one is for adam and one is for david adom you seem to have experience in this field licensing not anecdotally but from your experience is it more common than not that other municipalities restrict the ability to transfer of a liquor license both corporately and location  rules and regulations that vary by municipality i've seen it full fully terms restricted i've seen towns that have some old licenses that can still be sold and were grandfathered and then going forward they restricted them c of these two classes it really is kind of up to us what we decide we want to do council would probably no more use polities them i would but george you have an opinion or earth experience mr hall a patchwork is a very good word i mean i think in a lot of the smaller communities that operate under chapter one thirty eight there are transferable but probably a great high percentage of the licenses are concentrated in some of the bigger urban areas which have you know somerville cambridge boston and watertown cetera have many many special acts that they've added on the trend seems to be in some communities to actually license business by business legislatively you see a lot of special acts that authorize a city to grant a part of a license to a named entity to be exercised at a specific location such that what that business goes out of business not only does the license doesn't come back to the city the license disappears so it runs the spectrum and then the second question for david helper  is you explained if the business transfers the new owner has to come for a license i'm interested in for food licenses if the location wants to move if he'll sandwich shop wants to move from belmont street to cushing square below that's subject to license approval and for other businesses that are subject to licenses a barbershop or whatever are i will tell you that with food establishment you start from ground zero there's multiple reasons for that because you're suddenly starting in a space if you move your restaurant that may not have been a restaurant before or so then we have to look to see if the space appropriate for restaurants  have grease traps do you have appropriate venting accept or etc we would need to see the plans so it's a little more complicated than just putting liquor bottles on shelves if you're actually moving in establishment a better answer to your question would be something else that we issue the board of health issues cigarette sale licenses which people would say can potentially have a value because we only issue sixteen of them in the town of belmont you cannot transfer these either if you own a spa and you have a license to sell cigarettes and you decide to sell your spa you cannot sell your cigarette license you need to come back to us and if you're selling food you also need to come back to us you know in the case of a hand stores or something like that in order to be able to transfer both those businesses if you are a gas station that happens to have a license to sell cigarettes we don't necessarily get involved in that we do get involved with the cigarettes if you decide to move well for instance we coaching square when the handy spa there moved from one location to another in that particular case they were able to take the cigarette license when someone says we approved that the food establishment was so the cigarette license was baby to be carried by the person it was issued to after the business was allowed to move but if you give up your cigarette license you cannot sell it to anybody else and i would maintain that a cigarette business operation ours any change of location we have to reissue a common victuals license i'm curious about the non food licenses g s in operation in change location is a change in the operation of the business we get the for hours operation because of that nature is a new license to operate in a different location or different hours and stairways were beyond the question just a comment then i am going to do a one eighty standing here at the microphone  originally came up here with the intent of supporting these amendments to me i'm not an accountant i'm going to miss use of phrases but i was thinking that provided that this is a good going concern that it's either the same operation continuing with a no ownership or it's the same ownership continuing in a new location that was within the spirit of issuing the original license but if all of our other businesses in town including food barber shop and anything else that operates with a license is subject to they can't move their location nor can they sell their business without going back and getting that license recertified or reapproved suggests to me that there's no reason why alcohol licenses should be any different than the rest of the businesses that operate under licenses in our town articles that amendments that i think discussing them together is kind of muddy the waters a little bit it saddens me like when the laws were originally created all the liquor licenses were nontransferable and poor licenses were transferable provisions associated with them in two thousand and six when this when this when the town in this town bought it to mean decided to now establish licenses for retail sales about all one full of all and two beer and wine t provisions within that home rule petition in fact included non transferability so pouring licenses even when we expanded them never had non truths or ability the original retail licenses did in two thousand  the expansion of those retail licenses in two thousand and thirteen into the act of two thousand and fourteen did not have no entry of her ability provisions which in fact voided the original intent of the two thousand and six law ok so i could understand that the tw thirteen change was an oversight i would like to believe that there is some intention behind the laws that are in acted by time eating so my question is how would article two on amended capture the  laying out there the first one actually i would like to know with whom and tommy consulted with in their efforts and their research i'm not libyan precinct seven regular old citizen like adam dash i consider myself not an expert in liquor licensing laws around the state of massachusetts so and i don't consider myself an expert in the intent in one thousand nine hundred seventy so i wasn't living here so i had to go about finding the people who actually established liquor licensing in one thousand nine hundred seven consulting with them to see what the intent was what really you know they're at their future intent is paring back the emotion and kind of the strong reaction to some of the issues that we've faced the last couple years so i consulted people across all generations people who have lived here for a short period of time in a long period of time i've consulted lawyers legal counsel all the way up to the general counsel of the a b c see who is very helpful adam if you ever have any question she's amazing she'll take any questions from anybody she she has asked me not to repeat what she said so but i can tell you that i was very holistic in my approach starting with the campaign with her bony when this issue became a hot button and speaking with people and listening to hearing what the concerns really are that's that's why i pitched this and unfortunately one of the slides if you don't mind mr woodward if i can just point something out one of the slides that was removed about was about the valuation of a business it's not the liquor license itself like it is in boston and cambridge and somerville instead it's about the reputation of the business in the purchase and acquisition in the value of that business that includes what inventory is there what how the customers feel and what their customer base is it's much more valuable for a business like those in belmont to have an owner to owner person to person transfer in a location to location transfer then it is to just sell a liquor license that's why the amendment is written in the way  it is thank you thank you i did have a question for the selectmen so adam had mentioned the idea that you know number of businesses could come to us and request a license my question is what's the process for prioritizing which business gets it i understand there's like a minimum that people have to meet terms of you know location health etc but once you have before you qualified license or how i look at things to me from the intent of these liquor licenses was to create economic diversity of my jealousy within the local neighborhoods that's what i look at for me i never really want to have packed at stores in town even though i do frequent them we wanted opposition to the inn management i believe that the board of selectmen and and its licensing processes would look very favorably if a license needed to pass from one generation of a family business to another or if a business owner needed to change location to another location that was pleased to see the bowl as the previous one over the years that i've lived in town which go way before nine hundred ninety seven i've noticed that the most discussion about liquor licenses of any sort has to do with the net effect on the neighborhood and i think it's really important to keep the town in control of who owns the license and where that business is located in order to protect the neighborhoods i cannot for the life of me believe that decisions would be made where a good business that's been serving the community well couldn't relocate to a suitable location or a license couldn't pass from one person to another to operate substantially the same business in the same location that would be an error on the part of the board ok so given that i feel like if there is an error if we have to be cautious one way or the other i'd like the caution to be in favor of our neighborhoods and trust that the board of selectmen will make good decisions about granting licenses yeah yeah i know but i have had people voting twice right to own nine to thirteen obviously more than two thirds of the debate is terminated we now return to the vote under the amendment to article one yes mr mike it but the point of information since we addressed articles one into the amendment in the discussions did this vote and if a similar vote happens on the main article are we terminating the debate under both article no o under would even though we're considering them together we're proceeding one by one so this is just for article one so now we are voting on this olson's amendment all those in favor know there will be debate once we dispense with this amendment there will be debate on the main motion either as amended or not so we're voting on the amendment can debate again but so what we had is the motion to terminate debate two thirds required and that passed and that was turning debate on the amendment proposed by missiles and so now we've terminated for article one only as mr weissman we haven't gotten to article two in terms of the formality so now that we  terminated debate on the amendment presented by missiles and we will vote on the amendment that she presented only the amend under article  did it is that clear all right so now open open the bowl of voting yes well what we voted on this once already for what do we vote no no we didn't i'm not sure no but then the two thirty five look i think confusion it was clear let's back know we're going to vote on the amendment now to make sure because of the confusion with so we boated on the termination that's finished we approve the end of discussion we are now voting on the amendment so poll is open yes if you approve the amendment no if you don't all right please show the tally so yes thirty seven opposed to twenty six the amendment is defeated we now go to the discussion of the maine motion an amended because the amendment was defeated and i don't know if there's any further discussion under article one now we can discuss both articles that we're going to be voting on article one  black and white as presented to the town meeting and let me back up by saying you would be a fool to establish a business here either as a sole proprietorship or partnership you would either set up an l l c or a corporation now if you don't have an l l c or corporation you have interests in that corporation in that l l c and unless the and i don't say this is the on the possibility but unless the selectmen were to to restrict transfer ability of interest within the entity which is not stated in the proposal as to be presented to the legislature then people could transfer and not the not the entire if they wouldn't have to transfer when entity to another they could transfer the interest within the entity and it seems to me based on what stated in the proposed legislation that that would be not a violation of what is what's intended here and so therefore i think that it would solve the so if the equity loan or ship of the country company is changed i know that the licensing board has to approve that and i think it includes that that is a transfer of the of the of the license that would be covered by this thank you so we'll vote on terminating debate you want to put one second are right to thirty three to sixteen obviously more than two thirds debate is terminated we now vote on article one the main motion obviously an amended because you defeated the amend no we devoted to terminate debate this is quite a night right show the result two forty two forty forty eight the motion is adopted we have to take a five minute break for this in order for and then we'll come back to and i hope we can do