The Park Ride City Council tentatively approved the sale of alcohol for certain events at the historic Pickwick Theatre at Monday’s Committee of the Whole meeting.
The Copernicus Foundation, which will run live shows in the main amphitheater at the Pickwick, applied for a special liquor license to sell alcohol at the venue. The theater’s four smaller screens, which will continue to play movies, won’t be included in the arrangement.
According to Deputy City Clerk Brigid Madden, the license requires a one beverage per patron per transaction limit for alcohol sales.
Aldermen expressed concerns that patrons could find loopholes to buy drinks at the Pickwick without any intention of going to a show.
City Attorney Adam Simon said the only way a person could purchase alcohol was if they bought a ticket for a live performance at Pickwick.
4th Ward Ald. Harmony Harrington also had concerns about the times alcohol could be purchased, because the application made by Copernicus allows for patrons to purchase alcohol up to three hours leading up to a show.
Early entrance tickets and late exit tickets, likely for VIP meet and greets, will allow ticketholders to purchase alcohol, according to Simon. If patrons don’t have the right ticket, “they can’t loiter for hours after the show’s over, [and] they can’t get there way early – unless they have a ticket that says they can enter before the show starts,” he said.
Hubert Cioromski, the chair of the board for the Copernicus Foundation, took some questions at the meeting, saying that he had no intention of making a bar that functioned outside of concessions for shows held by Copernicus.
Mayor Marty Maloney told Cioromaki, “I don’t want it to be a bar… and I know [you don’t want to be a bar] either – and sort of raise the ire of some of our restaurants and bars.”
The city council will vote on final approval of the license at its next regular meeting in less than two weeks.