DONATE
Posted on 07/13/2011 3:31:11 PM PDT by DeaconBenjamin
Hundreds of bars, restaurants and stores across Minnesota are running out of beer and alcohol and others may soon run out of cigarettes -- a subtle and largely unforeseen consequence of a state government shutdown.
In the days leading up to the shutdown, thousands of outlets scrambled to renew their state-issued liquor purchasing cards. Many of them did not make it.
Now, with no end in sight to the shutdown, they face a summer of fast-dwindling alcohol supplies and a bottom line that looks increasingly bleak.
The Ugly Mug doesn't have enough beer to get through the baseball season. "Our inventories are diminishing rapidly over the next month," owner Erik Forsberg said. He was among a cluster of bar and restaurant owners who appealed Tuesday to a court-appointed special master to be allowed to continue buying alcohol during the shutdown.
Come Labor Day, cigarette smokers will be in the same bind.
The state has stopped issuing the tax stamps that distributors must glue to the bottom of every pack before it's sold for retail.
When Ross Amundson saw the shutdown coming, he shelled out more than $2 million to buy tax stamps that he hopes will last until mid-August. But with no legislative agreement in sight, he's worried about what comes next.
"We've been in business for 70 years," Amundson said. "My family started it. And all of a sudden this whole thing is going to screw us over? What happens to these retailers that we cover?"
Of the roughly 10,000 establishments that sell liquor in Minnesota, most managed to do so before the July 1 shutdown started. About 300 were caught with cards that expired on June 30 and no way to renew the permits. That number will grow to 425 by the end of the month.
(Excerpt) Read more at startribune.com ...
drive to Wisconsin. Geesh. Move to Texas
If there is no one to sell a license who is there to enforce selling without a license?
Rogue, vigalante,undocumented license inspectors.
Honey! Load up the SUV with smokes and booze! There’s money to be made in Minnesota. We could end up rich like the Kennedy family.
Its time for the good citizens of Minnesota to make a beer run to Iowa!!! Or Wisconsin!!!
Isn’t there an alcohol tax in MN? It looks like the state coffers will take another hit...thats good news for Iowa and Wisconsin.
“no way to renew the permits”
And if you operate without a valid permit then the jackboot
thug cops will take advantage of the situation (like they
always do) and shut you down with the butt and then the
barrel of a gun.
lol!!
Think of the carnage that will come if someone drinks a beer that doesn’t have the proper permit.
Excellent!
A few hundred places out of 10,000 is not much
Bingaringo.
In the older days when citizens had both smarts & balls there would be a hundred speak easys open for business right now
I think i know what you mean but it was a little complicated, no?
Yeah, I kinda figured that the Star-Tribune was trying to overdramatize the situation. But I fee sorry for those businesses (and the employees) that can't open while they are waiting to get a new liquor license. The State of Minnesota will miss their tax revenue for a while.
I may be wrong BUT rumor has it Wisconsin is a great drinking state.
If Minnesota runs dry. Minnesotans can always go next door to visit one of a hundred microbreweries. And Wisconsin will be glad to welcome their neighbors
Some bright guy will smuggle in smokes and booze from S/N Dakota.
MADD does not want to hear my stories about those wild Sunday drives.
That's what - October? Someone can't figure out a way around things by then?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.