MINOT – The City’s alcohol license ordinances were talked about at length Monday evening as the Minot City Council denied a bar owner’s license transfer.
Jon Lakoduk, owner of Duckpond Ventures, requested to transfer his retail liquor, beer, and wine license to the Regency Event Center located at 105 First Street Southeast for future events, including a wedding on March 11.
City staff recommended the council deny the transfer, noting that according to the North Dakota Century Code 5-01-01-10 and City Ordinance 5-1 “licensed premises” are defined as a premises where alcohol is normally sold and must be delineated by a blueprint or diagram included in the license application.
“The staff’s answer tied on what we can do, what our ordinances allow,” said Alderman Paul Pitner. “I would like to direct staff to take a look into our liquor license ordinances on a deeper level, if improvements can be made to allow Minot to be a little more open for business.”
Lakoduk told the council he will handle the alcohol sales in a safe and secure manner.
“As far as normally sold, in the meeting that we had between the city clerk and Chief Klug, we determined that the cooler would not be where it is normally and we expanded into the northeast corner into what’s known as the Windsor Ballroom,” said Lakoduk. “We would normally sell at that bar or out of the cooler next to the bar. That is delineated by the diagram provided.”
Lakoduck told the council that their denial would most likely be the death of his business.
“To ruin somebody’s special day, I don’t think that’s a reputation I want to have,” said Lakoduk.
“The problem here is an attorney wasn’t sought for his business,” said Chief of Police John Klug. “He didn’t even file a transfer until this year, and now we’re trying to rush to get his event approved. I don’t think that’s the way we should be doing business. That’s not our emergency.”
“I don’t normally disagree with staff in terms of their professionalism, but I think this is one of those situations where we’re letting bureaucracy stand in the way of good faith effort,” said Alderman Stephan Podrygula.
The City Council passed a motion to deny the transfer and direct staff to look into the ordinances on alcohol and bring back recommendations for the April 17 City Council meeting, with only Podrygula voting no.
