A new bill would give Boston up to 150 new liquor licenses earmarked for businesses in the outlying neighborhoods that have increasingly fewer local watering holes.
“It gives us as a city the ability to look at economic opportunities for different neighborhoods,” City Councilor Frank Baker, who’s introducing the bill on Wednesday, told the Herald.
The bill would allow Boston to issue up to 150 new nontransferable licenses from 2021 to 2023. All would revert back to the city if restaurants go under.
The city’s Licensing Board specifically could issue up to 15 licenses each for Dorchester, Roxbury, Mattapan, Hyde Park, Allston/Brighton, Roslindale, South Boston, West Roxbury, Charlestown and East Boston.
Baker, who represents Dorchester, repeated the common frustration in the city’s outlying neighborhoods: that the huge price tags restaurateurs are willing to pay to buy the existing liquor licenses to open swanky new digs downtown or in the Seaport have led to many local watering holes selling their licenses and closing up shop. It’s also hard, he said, for anyone looking to open up a new restaurant in Dorchester or Mattapan to do so if they would have to pay half a million dollars just to get the license.
“This is for the local entrepreneur,” Baker said.
City officials have pushed for more licenses for years. Before she became a congresswoman, then-City Councilor Ayanna Pressley in 2014 led the charge for 75 licenses for the areas outside of downtown, though some of the neighborhoods in question didn’t end up getting many of them, as there were no neighborhood-by-neighborhood restrictions. Mayor Martin Walsh has sought more licenses in the years since, introducing a proposal himself last year that would add licenses.
This bill is a home-rule petition, which means it would need council approval and the mayor’s signature before requiring passage by the Legislature and the governor’s sign-off. Beacon Hill is often unwilling to pass home-rule petitions, but Baker said he’s optimistic that the fact that this issue has percolated for years — and that Boston has a strong delegation — would help get this bill over the hump.
