RAWLINS — The Rawlins City Council approved the third and final reading of the Rawlins Municipal Ordinance 5.08.425: “Delivery of Alcoholic Liquors and Malt Beverages” during the meeting on Tuesday, Dec. 6.
The ordinance states that the city of Rawlins doesn’t currently have an ordinance that allows or regulates the sale or delivery of alcoholic liquor and malt beverages outside established licensed premises.
It also states, “the governing body of the city of Rawlins, Carbon County, Wyoming, has determined that it would be in the best interest of promoting and supporting small businesses to adopt such regulation. Modifying Rawlins municipal code in conformance with Wyoming state statutes will not serve to impede or impair the safety of the general welfare.”
From the first reading of the ordinance on Tuesday, Nov. 1, a change under Section 05.08.425 was made that reads:
“The licensee or permit holder may not contract for delivery service. Delivery persons shall be employed by the licensee or permit holder and shall adhere to the requirements of this chapter when delivering alcoholic liquors and malt beverages, including the requirements for responsible beverage service training.”
Following the second reading of the ordinance on Tuesday, Nov. 15, an additional change to the ordinance was made before the final reading.
The following change under Section 05.08.425 A5 was made:
“Microbrewery permit holders and winery permit holders shall only deliver their respective manufactured products.”
During the Nov. 1 meeting, councilor Chris Weisenburg asked whether or not TIPS training would be required of those doing the delivering.
TIPS, Training for Intervention Procedures, is a program for education and training for the responsible service, sale and consumption of alcohol, according to www.gettips.com.
During that meeting, city attorney Gwendolyn Wade said, “The actual purchase is made by the business that has the retail liquor license, which is required to have TIPS training.”
During the Nov. 15 meeting, Wade said, “After the questions and issues brought up during the first reading, I went back and reviewed our other ordinances and also discussed with the police department concerning what kind of issues there would be with ID checks and with the TIPS training. Our ordinance does require TIPS training for anyone who has the ability to deliver alcohol.
“Therefore, I amended this for the second reading to remove the ability of businesses to contract out delivery. Basically, it states that if they would like to provide this service, they have to provide their own employees to do it. They would be required to have TIPS training, just like servers and other employees at these businesses.”
During the second reading of the ordinance, Mayor Terry Weickum said that he is not fan of this ordinance.
“You know, I’ve thought about this. I voted positively the first time. But honestly, if somebody is at home and wants a bottle of alcohol, we have a taxi service,” Weickum said. “They can have the taxi take them to go buy it. I just really don’t want to interject the city in any way into this situation that could bring us more liability. It just makes me nervous. I’m not going to support it.”
His vote remained a “Nay” for the third and final reading.
“I voted for it the first time and against it the second time. I honestly think that as far as the city is concerned, we would be assuming some liability that is just not necessary,” Weickum said. “We do have a taxi cab company in town.
“If somebody wanted to go and they weren’t able to drive for some reason, they could support the local cab company. I’m just not in support of this.”
Councilor Linda Smith also voted against it.
Councilors Aaron Durst, Chris Weisenburg and Darril Garner and vice-mayor Jacquelin Wells voted in favor of it. Councilor DeBari Martinez was not present at the vote.
At the Dec. 6 meeting, Rawlins Police Chief Michael Ward said that he does not have strong feelings on the matter, one way or the other. However, he said that if he was going to “lean one direction,” it would be against the ordinance.
“Like all of us, I am a freedom-loving capitalist. I have a lot of respect for the private sector. It fuels our economy and pays for everything else,” Ward said. “All the levels of government, however, have a responsibility to protect the communities that they serve.”
Ward brought up the question as to who needs alcohol delivered.
“My biggest concern is that it’s going to be people that are underage that shouldn’t be having alcohol in the first place. The second group of people might be those who have already been drinking and don’t need any more alcohol,” he said.
