KANNAPOLIS — A group that supported all four of the winning candidates in this month’s mayoral and City Council elections has turned its attention to advocating an alcohol sales referendum.
Partners for Progress spokesman Max Chandler asked the newly-seated council Monday night to add discussion of the referendum to its Dec. 10 agenda. The council voted unanimously to set a public hearing on the issue.
The hearing will give both sides — supporters and opponents of alcohol sales — a chance to have their voices heard, Mayor Ray Moss said.
“It gives people an opportunity to speak, and that’s what we’ve said we’ll do, is hear them,”Moss said. “We can’t hear them if we don’t give them a platform.”
Restaurants and convenience stores already may sell beer and wine in the Rowan County portion of Kannapolis. But it’s the city south of the county line that concerns advocates of a referendum.
Partners for Progress says sales of alcohol — including beer, wine and mixed drinks — and the opening of ABC stores would broaden the tax base, create jobs, help prevent business closings and improve the quality of life.
Chandler said a glance just a little farther to the south reveals the impact expanded alcohol sales can have in the Cabarrus County portion of Kannapolis, where most of the city lies and development is most likely to occur.
“I think Concord is a perfect example of what can happen when you get liquor by the drink,” he said.
Since Concord voters approved alcohol sales in 1994, a number of new restaurants and other development has opened in the city.
That same year, Kannapolis voters overwhelmingly rejected alcohol sales. Chandler said he thinks the influx of new residents the city has experienced the past seven years could produce a different outcome in a new vote.
Chandler’s not one of those transplants. A retired A.L. Brown High School social studies teacher, he said he’s lived in Kannapolis his entire life. For him, he said, the issue is also a personal one. If he wants to buy a drink, he said, it should be his choice.
He is one of 25 to 30 core members of Partners for Progress, he said, and one of three co-chairs, along with Roger Haas, who just left the council after one term, and architect Carlos Moore.
Partners for Progress is a sister organization to Candidates Make the Difference, the political action committee that supported Moss and incumbent Councilman Randy Cauthen and contributed to the campaigns of new council members Paul Bessent and Darrell Hinnant.
All four said in interviews before the election they would entertain a request to set a referendum on alcohol sales. Moss has said he might support a referendum without receiving a petition signed by 35 percent of Kannapolis’ registered voters. With such a petition, state law would mandate the vote.
Chandler said an alcohol sales referendum wasn’t a campaign issue for his organization, but it has been one of its goals. With the new council taking office, it seemed like a good time to start pushing toward that goal, he said.
“Why put it off?” he asked. “It’s something I think needs to be done. The sooner we can get started, the quicker we can get this town moving.”
Contact Scott Jenkins at 704-797-4248 or sjenkins@salisburypost.com
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