ROCKPORT - Town officials said yesterday they were pleased voters rejected a ballot question that would have allowed grocery stores to sell wine.
Massachusetts voters said no to Question 1 by a vote of 1,180,708 to 915,076. Rockport followed the statewide trend, rejecting the question, 2,047 to 1,583.
Town Administrator Michael Racicot said the vote was good for the town, as it meant there would be no conflict with town bylaws. Rockport only allows alcohol sales in restaurants, with the purchase of a sit-down meal. The town, which had been dry for most of the last 150 years, approved liquor sales in restaurants at the 2005 Spring Town Meeting.
Now that the state denied the ballot question, "we don't have to fend off possible legal challenges to applicants who might have been denied a license," Racicot said. "We had anticipated spending a portion of our limited legal budget on these cases."
Racicot said the Board of Selectmen, the licensing authority in town, would most likely not have approved wine sales at grocery stores had the measure passed because the general town consensus is that such sales weren't wanted in Rockport.
Selectman Joseph Lisi said he voted against the question because he didn't want the additional access to alcohol in town above a drink with dinner in a Rockport restaurant.
Lisi said his concerns were the "what ifs" if the bill passed. If Rockport voted the measure down, but the state approved it, he said, selectmen might have denied applications for the licenses, and the applicants would then have the right to appeal. The decision would then be out of the hands of selectmen, he said.
"The vote resolves what could have been an issue; one that we didn't need," Lisi said. "We missed a situation that would require more decision making and discussion that would take away from other issues in town business."
Rockport, though it would have been allotted six licenses for wine sales in grocery stores, only has one store that would have qualified for an application, the IGA on Railroad Avenue.
Store manager Corey Hildonen said he was disappointed with the vote's outcome, because the IGA was hoping to obtain a wine sales license. Hildonen said if the IGA were to get the license, it would help the store's business and the overall tourism in Rockport.
Hildonen said he didn't see many "Vote yes on Question 1" signs during the campaign, and, in a small town, once a majority is found on an issue, it's easier for that side to persuade undecided people to vote their way.
"Rockport had been a dry town for a long time," he said. "I hate to say this, but I expected (the bill) not to pass."
Hildonen said he didn't believe safety issues raised were a big deal. He could see why people would be concerned if the provision allowed beer sales in grocery stores as well, but wine is not usually a favorite choice among youths.
The vote, he said, takes away an opportunity from the IGA's customers, who could have bought a bottle of wine with their groceries to have with their dinner.
Police Chief Tom McCarthy said that though he wasn't in favor of the bill, there weren't any particular public safety concerns that might have arisen if it were to pass.
One reason for this is that the licensing wouldn't have gone through in Rockport because the language of the town's bylaws limits liquor licenses solely to restaurants, he said.
He said that when talking to other police chiefs, public safety issues, such as drunken driving and fights, arose mostly from bars and taverns, where people would drink for hours on end. Package and convenience stores with alcohol licenses had less of a likelihood to cause problems, because imbibing of alcohol was not done on the premises.
