Outline to Resolve Alcohol Issues In Pacific Beach 2005

George R. Najjar

State law is clear as to exactly how many alcohol outlets should be allowed in Pacific Beach. However, the law has traditionally been ignored by those entrusted to uphold it. By law, this community should have no more than 18 alcohol outlets. But, Pacific Beach has over ten times that number. Pacific Beach also has some of the highest crime statistics in the city, much of it alcohol related. Given this information, would you support changing the existing conditional use permit (CUP) laws to establish a moratorium on any new alcohol licenses in Pacific Beach? And secondly, what would you do to reduce the number of existing alcohol license in Pacific Beach?

The Conditional Use Permit process provides local control. Oversaturated communities like Pacific Beach needs protection and enforcement of higher standards given its concentration of nightlife. This Conditional Use Permit process enables citizens and law enforcement to weight in on applications for licenses.

I live in Pacific Beach, within walking distance of the hub of activity. We have a wonderful local, family run Thai restaurant that can’t get a license to sell Thai beer and California wine. We have numerous bars which obtained and retain their licenses because they ostensibly sell food, assuming microwave pizzas, popcorn and hotdogs constitute food. We need to have some review process to separate decent restaurants from the alcohol frauds. If we wish to evolve the area toward a more mature crowd, we will need to meaningfully adapt liquor licenses toward restaurants rather than nightlife.

To that end, misused liquor licenses must be surrendered, and any new licenses issued to restaurants only, to be monitored by the SDPD and the ABC.