Court Opinion

ID: 9757847
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 23:01:33.554715+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:28:44.926517
License: Public Domain

Dissenting Opinion by
Mb. Justice Robebts:
In my view the majority incorrectly upholds the zoning board’s conclusion that appellants’ beer distributorship would be a permitted use by virtue of being a “retail business” under Art. VII, §701(3) of the zoning, code. Both the findings of fact of the board1 and the Liquor Code’s description of Detweilers’ license2 -indicate that appellants sell to clubs, hotels and restaurants as well as to consumers. Insofar as the former sales are concerned, Detweilers’ business may hardly be classified as retail; for the clubs, hotels and restaurants themselves resell the beer purchased from Detweilers and do so under a “retail dispenser’s license.”3 Surely, no more than one link in a chain of *541distribution may properly be denominated retail.4 Thus a significant portion of Detweilers’ proposed use of tlie premises is nonretail. That being so, the zoning board committed an error of law in interpreting the ordinance’s phrase “retail business” to encompass Detweilers’ proposed use.
Accordingly, I dissent.

 Act of April 12, 1951, P. D. 90, §102, as amended, 47 P.S. §1-102 (Supp. 1966) (definition of distributor) ; Act of April 12, 1951, P. L. 90, §431, as amended, 47 P.S. §4-431 (b) (Supp. 1966).

 “Applicants [Detweilers] sell beer by the ease lots and kegs to individual patrons who call at the place of business, and, in addition, applicants make delivery by truck of beer in case lots or kegs to customers at their homes and/or customers’ places of business, such as taprooms, social clubs, bars, etc.”

 Liquor Code §4-432(a), Act of April 12, 1951, P. L. 90, §432, as amended, 47 P.S. §4-432(a).

 See, e.g., Kerchner, Marshall & Co. v. Pittsburgh, 406 Pa. 158, 176 A. 2d 645 (1962); Fineberg v. Pittsburgh School Dist., 415 Pa. 108, 202 A. 2d 26 (1964).