Jackson Free Press

Police Chief Malcolm McMillin submitted an ordinance proposal to the Jackson City Council this week that would restrict alcohol retailers from doing business after 2 a.m. The ordinance specifically makes it unlawful for any owner, proprietor or an employee of any establishment with a liquor license to dispense light wine or beer—whether sold or given away—after 2 a.m. Monday through Sunday. The ordinance also restricts businesses from allowing patrons to bring their own alcohol onto the premises after 2 a.m.

The city currently prohibits alcohol sales in the city after 2 a.m., but ordinances don't stop patrons from bringing alcohol in from other sources. McMillin said the real teeth in the ordinance is the clause restricting patrons from bringing their own booze.

"What we're looking for, in essence, is this: Not only shall you not allow the sale, but you won't permit any to be brought in and consumed upon your premises. … There won't be any going to the tote store next door and buying a case of beer and bringing it back into that establishment and having them ice it down in a bucket for you and charge you to bring that beer into their establishment," McMillin said.

The chief said the recent spate of murders in the city demanded new thinking regarding the city's hooch codes.

"I think we had six murders since the first of the year—correct me if I'm wrong. Five of those have been on club property, so we have not been as diligent as we needed to have been in the past to insure that these clubs operate within the law," McMillin said, adding that police and the city should also be more active in making sure drinking establishments have clearly marked exits and that they don't exceed fire code requirements regarding the number of patrons allowed inside."

Ward 3 Councilman Kenneth Stokes asked if McMillin would consider excluding established nightclubs from the 2 a.m. crackdown.

"There's got to be some kind of exception for the places that have been open 20 or 30 years … as opposed to those who have a history of police calls (and trouble)," Stokes said.

McMillin recommended the council apply the law equally to all establishments for the sake of simplicity, but added that it was not his job to legislate.

"There are exceptions within that proposed ordinance that would allow discretion regarding resort areas … like the Farish Street (Entertainment District). … You'll have a business owner who has been around 20 or 40 years and she'll have to close her business (after a certain time) while you'll have these resort areas that can go 24 hours a day, and you'll have to justify that to her. That's why y'all get paid the big bucks," McMillin said.

Council President Leslie McLemore assigned the proposed ordinance to the Rules Committee for further discussion.

Other cities, like Vicksburg and Oxford, already have established ordinances restricting the operating times of bars and nightclubs. Oxford, in particular, restricts all liquor sales on Sunday and limits liquor sales before midnight Monday through Wednesday and on Saturdays, and restrict sales after 1 a.m. on Thursdays and Fridays.

Oxford Mayor Richard Howorth said his city's alcohol ordinance had predated his term, and that he could not gauge its impact on local businesses, but he did voice concerns that the ordinance dumped a mass of staggering drunks onto the streets.

"The only problem I've ever had with it is it flushes everyone out on the street all over the city at the same time … The bars are running people out at midnight, so you have all these people out on the street, who then get into their cars—some of them behind the wheel when they shouldn't be. The mathematics of the situation creates something of a public-safety hazard," Howorth said.

Five years ago the Oxford mayor's office considered restricting drinking until midnight, while allowing the bars to stay open later, allowing patrons a little more time to either sober up or find reliable transportation.

"The idea never gathered momentum, because anytime you try to change an alcohol law you're stirring things up," Howorth said.

Ward 1 Councilman Jeff Weill said he supported the ordinance, but might consider tweaking it to allow a sober-up period between liquor sales and closing time, similar to what Oxford was considering.

McLemore also assigned to the Rules Committee a recommendation for an interlocal agreement between the city and the county to eliminate a duplication of services in SWAT, child protection, and the Narcotics and Gun Interdiction Units. Both the city and the county feature those units, so the council is mulling the possibility of saving taxpayers' money by doing away with mirror units.

"We clearly need to look at ways to eliminate some of the duplications that would clearly save Hinds County some tax money," McLemore said.

Ward 6 Councilman Marshand Crisler was eager to begin talks on the agreement and questioned delaying it by placing it in a committee, though McLemore said the issue was complex and needed thorough venting in a committee.

Several council members, including McLemore, publicly fretted that hiring McMillin—who is also sheriff of Hinds County—to do double duty as the city police chief would lead to some consolidation of city and local government.

Previous Comments

ID

98366

Comment

"The chief said the recent spate of murders in the city demanded new thinking regarding the city’s hooch codes." Here's a different way to put it: "You all cannot handle freedom. You cannot handle being responsible adults, so we will take your rights away, and you will love us for it because you will feel safer." Enjoy.

Author

LawClerk

Date

2008-02-12T20:24:45-06:00

ID

98367

Comment

“I think we had six murders since the first of the year—correct me if I’m wrong. Five of those have been on club property, so we have not been as diligent as we needed to have been in the past to insure that these clubs operate within the law,” McMillin said" First, murder is illegal. Secondly, bringing a firearm into a bar, is illegal. The bar is not the problem. The patrons are. How can you blame a business for the acts of their patrons? Do you blame the JFP when one of it's readers, going to get a paper of course, decides to rob a convenience store? The problem is, they haven't shown that the clubs are violating the law. Show me that! Don't just create more laws to deal with a problem that is already illegal! (Murder, bringing guns into bars, etc...)

Author

LawClerk

Date

2008-02-12T20:27:37-06:00

ID

98368

Comment

Gives new meaning to "You drink you die!"

Author

pikersam

Date

2008-02-12T20:30:28-06:00

ID

98369

Comment

Alert the media: I agree with Law Clerk. This one smacks of PR move to me and smell of excess regulation, as LC says (which I'm against when it's not needed, whether against businesses for stuff they don't do, or when it comes in the form of voter ID when there isn't a problem). I may be wrong, but at least I'll be wrong alongside LC, who is used to being in that position. (Sticking tongue out.)

Author

DonnaLadd

Date

2008-02-12T20:30:51-06:00

ID

98370

Comment

(OK, I've agreed with LC one notable time before, but I won't go into that at the risk of blowing his cover.)

Author

DonnaLadd

Date

2008-02-12T20:31:24-06:00

ID

98371

Comment

Of course, since Melton got the city unionized now, all our taxes will be so high we won't be able to buy beer or go out! Glad to see he's still able to keep his backroom promises. Hope his republican brethren are happy!

Author

pikersam

Date

2008-02-12T20:42:07-06:00

ID

98372

Comment

"Alert the media: I agree with Law Clerk. This one smacks of PR move to me and smell of excess regulation, as LC says (which I'm against when it's not needed, whether against businesses for stuff they don't do, or when it comes in the form of voter ID when there isn't a problem)." Ladd... You know, it got cold outside tonight, so I guess hell did in fact freeze over! haha... "I may be wrong, but at least I'll be wrong alongside LC, who is used to being in that position." Hahaha... Thanks. The funny thing, or actually very not funny thing is, that we are going to find out if I'm wrong very soon. :(

Author

LawClerk

Date

2008-02-12T20:44:39-06:00

ID

98373

Comment

I agree with LC too. Look at all the convenience stores and restaurants that get robbed in the city. No one ever talks about closing them down. Granted, you don't hear of a lot of violence like you would at a club, but why discriminate against the clubs? If we are going to require clubs to close by a certain hour, I would agree to a sober-up period, so as not to have so many drunks out on the streets.

Author

golden eagle

Date

2008-02-12T20:50:30-06:00

ID

98374

Comment

The funny thing, or actually very not funny thing is, that we are going to find out if I'm wrong very soon. :( That's ominous and cryptic. Give me a hint.

Author

DonnaLadd

Date

2008-02-12T20:52:18-06:00

ID

98375

Comment

If you are going to mandate one business close at a certain time, it needs to be *all* businesses. Or, you could just step up patrols at those certain places, let them continue to do their business, and the cops could deal with the riffraff. I'm getting so tired of the "pass more laws" crowd. Don't we have enough? "The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren't enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws. " - Ayn Rand - "Atlas Shrugged"

Author

LawClerk

Date

2008-02-12T20:53:59-06:00

ID

98376

Comment

Oh please, don't quote her. I think we're all smart enough to talk about laws we don't need without bringing that idiot into the conversation.

Author

DonnaLadd

Date

2008-02-12T20:54:58-06:00

ID

98377

Comment

Ladd, not to go OT here, but, there is no way in hades that McCain will win the Presidency. So. We're going to find out if I'm right about Obama. That's all. :)

Author

LawClerk

Date

2008-02-12T20:55:15-06:00

ID

98378

Comment

"Oh please, don't quote her. I think we're all smart enough to talk about laws we don't need without bringing that idiot into the conversation." Oh! I love her writing. I'm reading through the Fountainhead right now. Read Atlas a loooong time ago, and recently decided to re-read it. It's amazing. Hahaha.. You know, I had a feeling you didn't like her, and, without insulting you too much (not in my eyes of course), I had a thought of who Dagny would be!

Author

LawClerk

Date

2008-02-12T20:57:04-06:00

ID

98379

Comment

Fine, enjoy her writing. But for God's sake, don't rely on it run a society. I'm not insulted at all, I assure you. There is no insult there. And I don't want to insult you, but it's impossible to have a decent conversation with an, er, objectivist for longer than a couple minutes. Put it this way: I'm not a fan of extremist kooks. I don't want to live in a communist world, a fascist world or an "objectivist" world. And, thank the good Lord, I don't have to.

Author

DonnaLadd

Date

2008-02-12T21:00:28-06:00

ID

98380

Comment

When I watched Stokes on TV the other day I got the impression he was totally 100% against the Chief-Sheriff’s nightclub proposal, which reminded me of his own past proposals for restricted hours for liquor sales by convenience stores. This article suggests that Stokes isn’t really that opposed to the 2 a.m. liquor crackdown as long as it exempts the ‘good’ clubs based on number of incident calls. That kind of selective application of government regulation is bad policy that would only open JPD up to negative perceptions of unfairness by the community and I think McMillian is wise in suggesting that it if the Council moves forward with an ordinance it should be enforced across the board except for resort status areas.

Author

Jeff Lucas

Date

2008-02-12T22:15:45-06:00

ID

98381

Comment

Ayn Rand's writing was a reaction to her own experiences in Soviet Russia; I think even she would admit that. I read Atlas Shrugged as a teenager and liked it okay at the time, though I wondered what happened to the people who weren't living in Galt's Gulch. I can't remember if I ever made it through The Fountainhead. I know I made several attempts. I kept wanting to write a parody ending to that early scene where whatshisface is standing naked on a cliff admiring his own body, in which the police would show up to haul him off for indecent exposure because the neighbors below were less thrilled with the whole idea. I also thought that Rand overstated the importance of skill, discipline, and socialization, all of which are more the result of conditioning than any person's intrinsic nature. I wasn't born with any of those qualities; people taught me these things. Rand was a gifted enough writer, but a little bit of a flake, IMHO, and it kind of weirds me out sometimes that her work is as popular in economic circles as it is. I come at her from a philosophy background, and I can say that she isn't taken very seriously in that field. I do think The Virtue of Selfishness is a very provocative title for a book, and that her position that there is no such thing as altruism, while not a position that I share, is one that I've been spending 16 years arguing with and still can't definitively "beat" by argument alone. The nice thing about Ayn Rand is that she's so approachable for teenagers that they can dig right in and tackle the sort of questions that she brings up, and most teenagers will find her arguments so offensive that they'll have to engage them. There isn't much about Rand that encourages an emotionally detached reaction. She either draws people into her own little version of the Moonies, or she makes them very angry. There's not much middle ground there!

Author

Tom Head

Date

2008-02-12T22:18:24-06:00

ID

98382

Comment

Oh, gotta agree with Donna and LawClerk. (There's a phrase I didn't expect to type.) And Ayn Rand would also agree with us. I'm all against people getting shot, but really, is there documentation of any kind that curfews (of any kind) have ever reduced crime?

Author

Tom Head

Date

2008-02-12T22:25:43-06:00

ID

98383

Comment

Tom, I'm sure that curfews can reduce crime. Just think if nobody were allowed to be outside during a certain time and then police could arrest anyone for being out past that time. I'm sure crimes would still be committed, but, police would no longer need probable cause as they could just say "that person was out past curfew." Anyways. Curfews are dumb and so are these new laws. I really don't know any other way to put it. As long as people keep electing these anti-freedom people into office, this is what we are going to get.

Author

LawClerk

Date

2008-02-12T23:00:43-06:00

ID

98384

Comment

Wow, I go away for a few days and the Ayn Randers come out! Hot damn! For the record I am a Nietzschean and not an Objectivist; but she was a provocative thinker and very important in the intellectual development of libertarianism and humanism. Now as for curfews, they are the hallmark of a police state. Period. no free society should have laws even close to a curfew except in times of extreme emergency.

Author

Willezurmacht

Date

2008-02-13T09:22:12-06:00

ID

98385

Comment

Great 10:18 post, Tom. Beyond being provocative on a basic level, there's not much there there in Rand. Curfews are stupid and don't work. They are always a PR effort to make it look like the police are doing something, and they just open up opportunities for abuse. Period.

Author

DonnaLadd

Date

2008-02-13T09:43:38-06:00

ID

98386

Comment

And curfews don't keep the real criminals at home.

Author

QB

Date

2008-02-13T11:08:50-06:00

ID

98387

Comment

I knew Tom didn't like Ann Rand. Naturally, I don't either. :) As for closing bars earlier... A. People will kill other people when they feel like it. B. If people can't behave and treat alcohol like something other than a feel-good drink, it's only natural that the government will step in and regulate things. Don't like the Sheriff's idea? How about behaving in a bar!

Author

Ironghost

Date

2008-02-13T16:35:33-06:00