Amid some push back from the public, Port City Spirits licence referral delayed with public comment period extended

Approval of a liquor license referral for Port City Spirits is on
hold while the city extends the pubic comment period towards
the application in front of council

A request for an amendment for the Liquor Licence for Port City Spirits, a new establishment proposed for Fraser Street will have to wait a few more weeks, that after City Council chose to postpone their decision until the end of this month, allowing for an extension of the public comment period for their Application.

Some of the challenges to the request were heard earlier in the evening as part of the City's Public Comment period at the start of the Council session, with a pair of participants sharing their concerns towards the location that Port City Spirits has chosen as well as their plans for Hours of Operation.

The Port City Spirit debate of sorts began wth some opening thought in the public comment period by one of the co-owners of the proposed Fraser Street establishment.

Kent Orton spoke to their referral request and provided some background towards what they would offering the public from their Tasting lounge.

"I just wanted to comment on what we intend to do there, which is create a space for locals and cruise ship passengers alike to come and enjoy local made cocktails with ingredients that we've sourced from the Great Bear Rainforest.  And we intend on kind of putting quality first rather than quantity as we see   kind of a gap in the market in the nightlife.

We are sensitive to some of the discussion  around noise in the area, because we understand that there are a number of residences up on Borden street, but we also have a short term rental above the space so we're cognizant of that and were doing our best to manage that and we don't think it's going to break a problem"

Among the participants in the public comment period,  two spoke out with concerns and objections related to the location of the establishment near a Pre School centre, the plans for a 10 AM opening time and the impact of their proposed hours of operation of the youth that attend the daycare, as well as some of the at risk people in the immediate area.

"I do have a strong objection to the application to establish a lounge area for 35 people to imbibe hard liquor right across the street from an active preschool. And I noticed in the application the proponents are asking for the hours to begin at 10 o'clock so that's pre school hours 10 in the morning ... 

I am well acquainted with a variety of family and child services that are offered through the Friendship House and rather down the block is the North Coast Community Services Society and they also offer quite an array of services for Social Service needs and of course at the end of the block is the Salvation Army Soup Kitchen. 

So that is an area where a lot of vulnerable people are attracted to, to  get assistance to you know get the help that they need ...   I just  feel that it's really out of touch to put an enterprise like this right in the midst of that area"

A concern was also raised about the short notice of the advisory of the call for comment by the City.

"I just would make a second brief objection that the comment period was so short, so you know the paper came out on Thursday I picked I up on Friday or Saturday  and I though OK wow I need to be thinking about this ... I did contact a few people but I could definitely contact a lot more that  I feel would be onside with this ... 

I would like to ensure that more people that are child advocates would see this and see that it doesn't make sense ...

I don't object to a distillery as a business operation, that's not my problem, my problem is definitely with the location ... "

Other items of note of concern were related to safety issues for the facility in question as well as plans towards off sales from the location.

One person spoke in support of the proposed Tasting room, noting that he lived in the immediate area and that he had been to a few other Tasting rooms across Canada and found them to be very classy places. He observed of the number of closed businesses, and rubble in the area and how it would be a welcome investment into the area.

"My thought is, it's a tasting room. Now I suppose one could blur the lines with bar. 

But I've been to many tasting rooms in Canada doing Gin, and down in the Lower Mainland and Ontario they're very classy places, I've never been in a Tasting room that wasn't very kind of an upscale kind of a classy place.

And seeing the folks connected with it, I suspect that they're going to make it a very classy place

I think this is great for the neighbourhood  if someone wants to invest and spruce the neighbourhood up I think there's an advantage to that."

Ray Pederson, who is a co-owner of the proposed Tasting Lounge also spoke their plans providing some additional details towards what they have in mind, as well as to address the 10 AM opening request, noting that would be mostly to access the Cruise visitors to the community.

Among his themes was the lack of social activities available in the community and how the proponents believe that it will add to the social options for residents in the Prince Rupert area. He also explained why they are seeking to expand their licence to that of a lounge to add beer and other options for guests.

Towards Council's commentary and review of the request, it had as much in the way of conversation as that which was found in the public comment period.

Councillor Skelton-Morven observed on some of the commentary that was heard previous in the evening and some of the issues that were raised that he believes were addressed while also noting of some of the socio economic issues. 

"I think some pieces were really highlighted tonight. I think being able to hear some of that perspective is really important. 

Given my experience in just having seen the Wheelhouse in operation .. it really depends on the ownership of the establishment I think that's a key facet to kind of take in and also the nature of the establishment.

This particular way and thirty five seats is not particularly large so we're not seeing hundreds of folks climbing out into the streets and different things like that. 

And a lot of these clarifying factors, and there were some concerns myself that I had with the location at first until those were addressed. 

And based on tourism a lot of the times its more of the experience and not necessarily kind of a binge establishment where folks are going to be piling out in the streets and things like that and pandemonium" 

Councillor Forster also noted of the commentary heard earlier in the evening as well as comments she has received from residents previous. 

"I appreciate the dialogue we've had tonight because it did address some of the concerns.

I too received quite a few phone calls today and I did some of my own research and reached out to some of the Daycares that were mentioned to find out if they had any concerns and they did not raise any for me.

I do appreciate the clarification about 10 AM not being every day, that for me was actually quite a big one, that it would only be the odd time when it happened to be a tour, which I think was quiet a reasonable explanation.

Some of the concerns that I've had are actually the area and that were are a lot of vulnerable and at risk people so I'm hoping to learn more about how there's going to be some different mitigation strategies put forth by the business owner.

It's not an expectation it's just something that Teri, a person in the community would like to hear"

Councillor Cunningham observed that he was still on the fence on the issue and suggested that the proponents should have a public meeting with the public towards their initiative. 

He also raised concerns about the proximity of the DayCare facility and the impact of parking on the area, suggesting the need for a closer look at the request for the amendment. 

"We've got  to look at the two sides of the coin, I kind of think, I would like the Port City Distillery to actually have a meeting with the public and I think that could solve most of the problems cause they seem to solve a lot of them.

Like Councillor Skelton Morven said there's a social economical benefit to this and there's also a social downside to it it sounds like. 

So I really think that we should take a closer look at, I'm sitting on the fence o nit in a lot of ways"

Councillor Randhawa also shared his concerns over the 10 AM opening plans and the issue of parking in the immediate area. 

 City Manager Rob Buchan was asked to clarify the nature of the request and how the issues of parking are related to it, which he observed was completely different that the liquor licence referral process. 

Councillor Forster also asked how much in the way of correspondence that the city received towards the application, the Corporate Administrator observed how there was only one other correspondence related to it. 

Councillor Skelton-Morven spoke to some of the challenges that a delay may provide for their initiative holding to the belief that the Council should decide on the evening. 

"Yeah deferring an opening at this point in time with the renovations done and all of those other pieces. Yeah, delaying the process  ... there is ongoing costs that come with that there's a lot of heavy upfront costs that come with operating a distillery"

After more discussion on the parking issue, Councillor Cunningham noted that with the parking bylaw issues still to be resolved it didn't really make a difference if the Liquor Referral amendment was deferred for two weeks. 

"I'm just trying to wrap my head around this parking thing. If they can't open until the parking is resolved and we've tabled the parking bylaw until  a later date. It doesn't matter if we defer for two weeks or not. Because nothing can be done about parking for two weeks and they can't open for two weeks"

Council considering that observation, then chose to postpone the Amendment for Port City Spirits until the next regular meeting, accepting a call from Councillor Forster for staff to extend the comment period, which now will come to a close on May 23rd. 

Councillor Skelton-Morven was the lone vote against the postponement. 

City staff were instructed to post the extension of comment period notice to the City website.

You can review all of the elements to the discussion from the City's Video archive page at two points, the Public Comment period starts off the Monday session, while Council's conversation and decision to defer a decision until later in the month comes at the one hour,  minute mark.

More notes related to the Monday Council Session can be reviewed through our Council Archive page.