The public will have its chance at Wednesday’s Metro Council meeting to weigh in on several proposals that would let more businesses serve alcohol in the city-parish, as well as a funding plan to reopen Baton Rouge’s city jail as a 24-hour misdemeanor detention facility on a limited basis later this year.
Up for a public hearing and vote are a pair of separate ordinances that would clear the way for brewpubs and microdistilleries, as well as expand wine, beer and liquor tastings at area retail outlets.
The former ordinance, co-sponsored by four council members, would allow for the permitting of microbreweries and microdistilleries, as well as set fees for those permits. Councilman Ryan Heck, who is among the co-sponsors, has told Daily Report the ordinance is meant to further economic development in the city-parish.
Meanwhile, a proposal by Councilman Buddy Amoroso would expand the current wine sampling license to allow for on-site samplings of beer and liquor, as well as reduce the cost of an annual license from $600 to $120. Both Heck and Amoroso say their ordinances will simply bring city-parish law in line with state laws on the matters.
Also at Wednesday’s meeting, a public hearing and vote is expected to be taken on a proposal to use $500,000 from warrant recall fees to reopen Baton Rouge’s city jail as a 24-hour misdemeanor detention facility for two-week stints later this year. The proposal would allow law enforcement officials to keep the 150-seat jail that’s located beneath the City Court open continuously for five separate two-week periods. The jail currently operates during business hours only.
Also up for a hearing and vote is a zoning change that would allow for alcohol sales at Paul and Ann Connelly’s Studio Park development at the corner of Jefferson Highway and Lobdell Avenue. The development already features the Anne James Hair Salon, and construction has begun on a Sherwin-Williams Paint Store that should be ready in November. In addition, plans are in the works for a new art gallery, fitness studio, 2,600-square-foot farm-to-table café and two lease spaces for residential retail design businesses.
Among the items up for introduction this week is a second attempt to grant a tax increment financing district for a proposed 135-room Courtyard Marriott at the corner of Third and Florida streets in downtown Baton Rouge. South Carolina-based Windsor Aughtry Hotel Group and their local partners, Gordon Leblanc and Moffett Leblanc Strain, are seeking approval from the council for the TIF to help cover construction costs of the $22 million hotel. Specifically, the developers are asking for a two-cent TIF that will generate an estimated $700,000 per year in city tax revenues, $100,000 of which will be rebated back to the developers.
In July the Metro Council rejected by a 5-4 vote a nearly identical TIF for the project. But as Daily Report recently reported, the developers have been in discussions with several council members since then and have garnered support from other downtown business owners and city administrators.
The Metro Council convenes at 4 p.m. on the third floor of City Hall, 222 St. Louis St. See the complete agenda.
—Steve Sanoski
