The findings that led to the passage of Planning Code Section 785 and the establishment of the Excelsior Alcohol Restricted Use District back in 2008, prohibiting the opening of any new liquor stores in the area:
There are an unusually large number of establishments dispensing alcoholic beverages, including beer and wine, for off-site consumption in the area located generally on Mission Street from Silver Avenue to the Daly City border. The existence of this many off-sale alcoholic beverage establishments appears to contribute directly to numerous peace, health, safety, and general welfare problems in the area, including loitering, littering, public drunkenness, defacement and damaging of structures, pedestrian obstructions, as well as traffic circulation, parking and noise problems on public streets and neighborhood lots.
The existence of these problems creates serious impacts on the health, safety, and welfare of residents of nearby single- and multiple-family areas, including fear for the safety of children, elderly residents, and visitors to the area. The problems also contribute to the deterioration of the neighborhood and concomitant devaluation of property and destruction of community values and quality of life. The number of establishments selling alcoholic beverages for off-site consumption and the associated problems discourage more desirable and needed commercial uses in the area.
Written with a five year Sunset Provision which automatically repeals the Excelsior Alcohol Restricted Use District in three months (“unless the Board of Supervisors, on or before that date, extends or re-enacts it”), this afternoon San Francisco’s Land Use and Economic Development Committee will review an amendment sponsored by Supervisor Avalos which would strike the Sunset Provision and make the restriction permanent.
∙ The Excelsior Alcohol Restricted Use District and Proposed Amendment [sfbos.org]
I bet the existing liquor stores love this amendment. “Permanent” is an awfully long time; why not extend it for another 5-year term? More to the point, is there evidence that the 5-year restriction has worked to restrain loitering, littering, and drunkenness in this neighborhood?
Well, Avalos is doing at least ONE decent thing during his tenure. The proliferation of these liqueur stores in the excelsior is so ghetto. Moratorium, amen!
Have to agree with 48yo hipster here; there’s lots of less socially destructive ways to make money than to sell intoxicating and addictive substances to low-or-no income people.
Who knows? Perhaps one day in the near future, we’ll have a full-on cure for Kaposi’s sarcoma or something because someone was dissuaded from using their available capital to open yet another liquor store by this municipal restriction and decided instead to invest it in biomedical research.
I believe what is being proposed is a permanent ban, not a further moratorium, which I would suggest is the more prudent step. Maybe, over time, a new crop of liquor businesses would deal more responsibly with the public than the current ones who, despite being charged with destroying the neighborhood, are now being handed a permanent monopoly. Lucky them.
Yes, granting a monopoly to existing stores is never a good idea. (Doesn’t work with moratoriums on restaurants either…that was a problem in Noe Valley for years). Existing businesses are entrenched and don’t improve. Or can sell their rights at exhorbitant rates to others. None of this is good for customers.