Permitted vendors would be able to serve at Maximo Park, Demens Landing and Dell Holmes Park and at three adult centers.
By ANDREW MEACHAM
Published October 31, 2004
ST. PETERSBURG - The City Council will rule Thursday on a request by the parks department to allow alcohol in three city parks for some events.
The change would be limited to city-sponsored or co-sponsored events and would require vendors to get a permit and insurance in advance.
In other words, it would remain illegal for individuals to carry a cooler into a park and pop open a cold one. But wedding parties, reunions and the like could serve drinks.
Neighborhood groups bordering one of the parks, Dell Holmes near Lake Maggiore, have split on whether to support the change.
The revisions to the city's alcohol ordinance would add Maximo Park, Demens Landing and Dell Holmes Park to a short list of parks in which alcohol may be sold and consumed. The city is also asking that two adult recreation centers, Azalea and Bay Vista, and the Sunshine Multi-Service Senior Center become allowable sites for alcohol vending.
Because the city owns the property, anyone staging an event - a wedding or family reunion, for example - would need to apply at least 15 days in advance and get a permit or license for the event.
Parks director Clarence Scott and other parks officials visited neighborhoods in October in preparation for Thursday's final reading of the ordinance.
The Greater Pinellas Point Civic Association informally signed off on allowing alcohol at Maximo Park for special events.
Officials did not seek neighborhood approval for Demens Landing, as Shakespeare in the Park organizers have sold alcoholic beverages there for years. But the theater troupe has had to appeal each year to the City Council for an exception to the ordinance. If the new ordinance passes, that will no longer be necessary.
The bulk of Dell Holmes Park lies within Lake Maggiore Shores, but its western end dips into Highland Oaks. After meeting with Scott, the Lake Maggiore Shores Neighborhood Association board voted to approve the revised ordinance.
Highland Oaks members unanimously turned it down.
Highland Oaks president Betty Dendy said the park should be used primarily by area residents. She raised concerns about the possible effect of alcohol on children.
"If they are drinking like that in the park and the children are exposed, that means there is a big chance of someone injuring someone else."
Lee Metzger, the city services administrator, disagrees. "This doesn't mean that you and a buddy can go over to that park and take your cooler full of beer and sit and drink beer in the park," he said. Such unlicensed, informal drinking is illegal now and would remain so.
Dell Holmes Park, so named months after the former parks director died last year, was considered a tract of Lake Maggiore. Residents have called it Lakeview Park, at about 20th Street and 28th Avenue S. Only Circus McGurkis, an open-air market sponsored by the Society of Friends, has staged regular events there.
Alcohol sellers catered to large crowds in 2003 at Ribfest, Sail Expo and the Tampa Bay Blues Festival, all in Vinoy Park. Other parks where alcohol is permitted at city-sponsored or co-sponsored events are Straub Park, Spa Beach, the Pier approach and Poynter Park.
Metzger said Scott was responding to inquiries about adding the three parks to the list.
Allowing on-premises consumption at Azalea, Bay Vista and the Sunshine Center was the city's idea. Groups can rent these halls for weddings and other large gatherings, which means revenue for the city.
"We were losing a lot of rentals because people would like to have alcohol," Metzger said. The City Council will meet at 8:30 a.m. Thursday at City Hall, 175 Fifth St. N.
