Mayor nixes liquor license

[Concerned]

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Mayor nixes liquor license
Antioch restaurant is partly owned by trustee

By Corrinne Hess
[e-mail]
Posted Thursday, July 19, 2007

Antioch mayor and liquor commissioner Dorothy Larson has ordered the Double Eagle Sports Club to surrender its liquor license for failing to report a village trustee is a partial owner.

Larson’s ruling came after a group of five village residents filed a complaint with the commission upon learning Trustee Robert McCarty was involved with the business.

Village code specifies an elected official cannot hold a liquor license. This week, Larson attempted to change the code to parallel the less strict state liquor law, but the village board voted 4-1 to reject it.

Larson could not be reached for comment Wednesday.

The owners of the Double Eagle have been fined $250 and must surrender the license by Saturday unless an appeal is filed with the state liquor commission, which is likely.

“Absolutely we will file an appeal,” said Wayne Giampietro, attorney for the Double Eagle Sports Club.“I’m disappointed by the ruling but not terribly surprised. The mayor, in her ruling, struggles with the issues. This way, we are going to get a definitive answer from someone.”

Double Eagle has 20 days to file the appeal. While the case remains open, the restaurant at 955 Route 59, Antioch, will keep its license.

Giampietro contends state law, which allows a municipal board member representing a community of 50,000 people or less to hold a liquor license, supersedes village code.

Antioch officials, with the exception of McCarty, disagree.

McCarty, his wife, Dawn, and Vincent and Arlene Tomasello each own 25 percent of the business.

The Tomesellos, who were not available for comment, attended Monday’s village board meeting, where they took full responsibility for unintentional errors on the liquor license application.

McCarty has said he will put his business interests first but will not resign from his trustee position until a court tells him he must do so.

Owners of the Double Eagle began work on a new, larger restaurant in January. That building, next to the existing restaurant, is slated to open in December.

“This is a pretty exciting time for us,” McCarty said.“We are looking forward to moving forward with the new building and getting this other issue solved and done with.”

[Antioch Report]

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|Flag |#9 13 hrs ago
First and foremost, the application was filled out incorrectly. Convieniently left off the application was the true ownership in the corporation including the trustee, who could not legally have interest in any liquor license. Also overlooked, is the Illinois state law that forbids a government official with interest in a liquor license to vote on anything to do with a liquor license. Since buying into the business, the trustee has voted on at least four issuances of liquor licenses for special use. Illegal? Absolutely, according to state law, the same law neither the trustee nor the Mayor bothered to read prior to issuing the license.
Just for the record, there was more missing off the application than just his name.
I find it alarming that no one is concerned with a village trustee and mayor asking the village board to amend a law for them because it is convenient for them. Once you change this ordinance, where do you stop? How can they expect any village resident to follow the ordinances if they themselves are not willing to? This is not about a trustee being steamrolled out of office, it's about a trustee and mayor who never bothered to look into local ordinance prior to issuing an illegal license in the first place. If the trustee was so concerned, why didn't he try to amend the ordinance prior to buying in to the business? If it was so important to him, why didn't he make sure everything was filled out correctly in the first place? Oh yea, I forgot, Antioch ordinance clearly said he could not hold a liquor license. How convenient for him and the mayor.
This disgusts me that they would ask to waive the rules for themselves when it is them who intact our laws in the first place.
Want to park you semi in a handicap spot, why not. Build a seven story hotel out of match sticks, go right ahead. How do you stop once you started down this slippery slope?
I believe he knew what he was doing as did the mayor. Too many coincidences to be an accident or oversight. How can a trustee and mayor simply forget to check the local ordinances before they did this, as they claim? They said they checked with the state law and it was allowed. Lucky for them they didn't look at the local ordinances, you know, the ones they Wright. They might have found something that could have upset their plans.
Lucky them!

[Some Class]

Antioch Report wrote:

This is a post about this article:
Reply »
|Flag |#9 13 hrs ago
First and foremost, the application was filled out incorrectly. Convieniently left off the application was the true ownership in the corporation including the trustee, who could not legally have interest in any liquor license. Also overlooked, is the Illinois state law that forbids a government official with interest in a liquor license to vote on anything to do with a liquor license. Since buying into the business, the trustee has voted on at least four issuances of liquor licenses for special use. Illegal? Absolutely, according to state law, the same law neither the trustee nor the Mayor bothered to read prior to issuing the license.
Just for the record, there was more missing off the application than just his name.
I find it alarming that no one is concerned with a village trustee and mayor asking the village board to amend a law for them because it is convenient for them. Once you change this ordinance, where do you stop? How can they expect any village resident to follow the ordinances if they themselves are not willing to? This is not about a trustee being steamrolled out of office, it's about a trustee and mayor who never bothered to look into local ordinance prior to issuing an illegal license in the first place. If the trustee was so concerned, why didn't he try to amend the ordinance prior to buying in to the business? If it was so important to him, why didn't he make sure everything was filled out correctly in the first place? Oh yea, I forgot, Antioch ordinance clearly said he could not hold a liquor license. How convenient for him and the mayor.
This disgusts me that they would ask to waive the rules for themselves when it is them who intact our laws in the first place.
Want to park you semi in a handicap spot, why not. Build a seven story hotel out of match sticks, go right ahead. How do you stop once you started down this slippery slope?
I believe he knew what he was doing as did the mayor. Too many coincidences to be an accident or oversight. How can a trustee and mayor simply forget to check the local ordinances before they did this, as they claim? They said they checked with the state law and it was allowed. Lucky for them they didn't look at the local ordinances, you know, the ones they Wright. They might have found something that could have upset their plans.
Lucky them!

Why didn't the Mayor amend the Chicago Ridge Village ordinance prior to the election in 2005? Surely he knew the state law as the Liquor commissioner and the local law as mayor and that they conflicted. He had a trustee candidate on his ticket with a liquor license that didn't qualify to hold office and after he didn't revoke the liquor license he swore the trustee in anyway. How much did that cost? There had to be something in it for the Mayor fail to do his job twice for the same business. Lucky them

[Cheese]

Some Class wrote:

<quoted text>Why didn't the Mayor amend the Chicago Ridge Village ordinance prior to the election in 2005? Surely he knew the state law as the Liquor commissioner and the local law as mayor and that they conflicted. He had a trustee candidate on his ticket with a liquor license that didn't qualify to hold office and after he didn't revoke the liquor license he swore the trustee in anyway. How much did that cost? There had to be something in it for the Mayor fail to do his job twice for the same business. Lucky them

You are not talking about payola here are you? Dudes went to jail for that stuff years ago. Why would one elected guy demand money from other elected guys that he ran for election with? I'm not an elected guy but why would somebody in elected power pay off somebody else on the same board? Even if you wanted that board guy to leave your board and he said he wanted to be bought out that must be wrong, but if you really thought that you ran with the right guy who would do the right stuff you would never make him pay you would you?

[Mansfield]

when willit end