By Ellysa Gonzales and Nicole Crites
When Lubbock went “wet” in 2009, many were divided about allowing alcohol sales within city limits. Now, almost seven years after the controversial vote, officials say opponents’ biggest concerns did not pan out.
Lt. Ray Mendoza/The Hub@TTU
The number of alcohol-related offenses in Lubbock has hardly changed since alcohol sales became legal, said Lt. Ray Mendoza, a spokesman for the Lubbock Police Department. LPD works to keep it that way, with a traffic unit specifically targeting drunk drivers and increased patrols to keep an eye on activities around alcohol businesses.
The biggest change in crime with a correlation to alcohol sales has been domestic assaults, Mendoza said.
“We don’t think they’ve actually gone up,” he said. “But there’s a correlation there.”
A report by the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission, or TABC, shows the agency has registered an average of 47 alcohol-related complaints per year in Lubbock since 2005. The year with most complaints in the past decade was 2009 to 2010, the year Lubbock became “wet,” with 66 alcohol violations.
Before 2009, Lubbock was the largest “dry” city in the country, said community member Melissa Pierce, who spearheaded the campaign to allow alcohol sales. At the time, alcohol was already available along The Strip, a chain of alcohol stores on Lubbock’s outskirts, which was always busy on weekends, said Pierce.
Countless people would arrive from around the county and wait in line, Pierce said. Lubbock residents would drive 15 minutes to the outskirts, wait for at least 30 minutes and then drive back for another 15 minutes, just to buy alcohol, she said.
The issue had been raised and shot down many times, she said, and opponents had called for boycotts of businesses owned by those supporting alcohol sales in the city. But Pierce was a homemaker, and her husband was employed by a company based in another state.
“I had nothing to lose,” she said.
Melissa Pierce ran the campaign to allow alcohol sales in the city limits. Elyssa Gonzalez for The Hub@TTU
The Lubbock Chamber of Commerce initiated the 2009 campaign, gathering signatures to petition to place the issue on the ballot. Eddie McBride, president of the Chamber of Commerce, said it was important for Lubbock citizens to have the opportunity to vote on alcohol sales.
Supporters won, and alcohol sales began pouring into city limits around June.
There are currently 527 businesses within the city limits and 25 in the county with a license to sell alcohol, said Kyle Russell, licensing regional supervisor for TABC. This number is significantly higher than the count of alcohol-licensed businesses before 2009, he said.
There are several different categories and types of complaints, said Maj. Mark Menn, regional enforcement supervisor for TABC region 1. The most common alcohol complaints in Lubbock are both in the public safety category: sales to minors and sales to intoxicated individuals.
Since 2009, there have been 75 complaints labeled as “sell/serve/dispense/deliver alcoholic beverage to minor,” according to TABC’s list of administrative alcohol complaints in Lubbock. Of those, 63 percent were issued to stores such as 7-Eleven and EZ Mart rather than bars or restaurants.
In the last decade, there have been 116 alcohol-related complaints, meaning 65 percent have been registered after the law passed.
The process of applying for an alcohol license is tedious, Russell said. Businesses are required to post signage, give public notice, pay fees and wait for a specific period of time before alcohol can be sold in their establishments, he said.
Keeping a license is just as tedious.
Though sales to minors and intoxicated individuals are the most common TABC complaints, they are not the only ones. Punishments vary depending on the frequency and severity of complaints at each location, Russell said. They can include fines and/or suspensions.
TABC and LPD work closely to monitor complaints, Menn said.
Sting operations are common. TABC enlists the help of minors, who are sometimes the teenage children of TABC employees or local teenagers interested in becoming police officers, Menn said.
The individual is usually sent inside, asked to grab a drink and volunteer little information. Officers and sting participants take care not to influence the clerk’s decision to sell.
Alana Kiker/The Hub@TTU
“We try to give the benefit of the doubt to the clerk,” Menn said.
TABC contacts LPD when its officers believe there is a reason for the department to step in and vice versa. When there is an alcohol-related crash in which the subjects can be traced to local businesses, LPD calls on TABC, Mendoza said.
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