In this week’s Mercury (hitting the streets this afternoon) I write about the conflicted role of the Oregon Liquor Control Commission (OLCC) as both the distributor of alcohol and the regulator of its consumption.
The agency itself is a leftover from the repeal of Prohibition, when a few states were worried about a rapid spread of drunkenness and decided to enforce their own temperance laws and controls on sales. That gave rise to the 19 states that are currently “control states,” where a state agency has a monopoly in selling some or all alcoholic beverages. Here, liquor stores are state-run, and the OLCC handles wholesaling of beer and wine to distributors collects taxes on beer and wine sales.
As you may guess, this bothers some people who don’t like the state running things. Today’s editorial in the Oregonian takes what it calls “a hard look at liquor sales” in Oregon. Editorial page editor Bob “DUII” Caldwell and friends mention, but stop short of endorsing, Chris Dudley’s proposal to abolish the OLCC’s monopoly on liquor sales. They point to a pair of initiatives that could see the ballot in Washington (another control state) this fall, which would put liquor sales into private hands. Costco is a big backer of that initiative, and began petitioning its shoppers in May.
And on Friday, July 9, Jeff Alworth posted a call to “Kill the OLCC” to his Beervana blog. He draws attention to another recent Oregonian op-ed by vintner William Hatcher that calls for completely dismantling the organization. He also links to a piece by the Bend Bulletin‘s Nick Budnick about a private audit that found some pretty damning evidence of inefficiencies within the labyrinthine organization.
If the OLCC stops running liquor stores, the state misses out on the markup from hard-liquor sales. But if places like Safeway can sell it, the state can still slap a heavy tax on the stuff.
YES. It IS a monopoly and should in no way have that much control over the distribution, sale and profit from alcohol. OLCC is an outdated parasite.
Srsly… I’d vote for Dudley if he got rid of the OLCC.
A no-brainer.
I have to admit, Dudley is smarter than I thought. Good ploy to get votes.
YES!
tk.’s got it.
Oh, heck yeah. Get rid of them.
A friend of mine applied to open a store in the Pearl, a while back, when the OLCC called for applicants. They decide where and when a new store can open, and they are the only supplier you can buy from. The owner of the store gets something like 3.5% of sales.
An interesting side of effect is – think about it – no cost of ordering inventory. The store never really buys the liquor, they just sell it and collect their percentage then. That’s why a lot of liquor stores seemed to be stocked to the gills, because all those bottles were free to them. Why NOT carry 300 bottles of Kahlua at all times? Doesn’t cost them a thing.
It’d break my heart if others weren’t able to experience the pleasure of those five-hour OLCC server’s permit classes.
“damning efficiencies”?
Hating the OLCC is passe now that the republicans are on the bandwagon.
Fuck and yes. This would do wonders for the fight all-ages venues have been facing for a while, too.
Want to boost the economy? LET PEOPLE FUCKING DRINK.
But if we get rid of it now, I won’t be able to meet my life’s goal of being appointed to head the agency, then shutting it down the next day. Why is Chris Dudley trying to destroy my dreams?
So a friend of a friend is trying to expand his business in a well known commercial district, This is an expansion of one of his restaurants. The BIG hold up is the OLCC, there is a filer on the windows of the to be opening restaurant on how they are waiting for the OLCC. This is freaking ridiculous!
@ujfoyt: fixed. thanks.
I must be the only one who doesn’t want to see liquor stores on every corner.
You won’t, superduper. If anything we’ll be seeing LESS liquor stores because grocery stores and other private businesses will be able to sell liquor in their stores like California and such. Existing liquor stores will likely stay the same or be shut down/turned into convenience stores.
You know Stefan, harping on Caldwell’s DUI when this story is not about A) driving or B) DUI laws makes you seem both immature and puritanical at the same time.
It’s tabloid-y, and it sets a precedent I doubt you or your co-workers are likely to profit from.
I made my mind up on this almost 15 years ago. The OLCC must go.
i want to be able to go to my all-night Freddie’s & buy rum at 3am. that’s American Freedom.
I’m not allowed to drink home-brew at Plew’s anymore thanks to the OLCC. Pretty sure I’m not even allowed to trade bottles of home-brew with others thanks to the OLCC. I actually wrote Rep. Kopel Baley about this last night.
@atomic: You are right. A better DUI to mention would be the one that the head of the OLCC got a few years ago. (They resigned.)
I think somebody smart said: “Be careful what you wish for”.
If you live in Oregon, I have one question for you: Why would you want to be more like California? Because their system is so efficient and works so much better for them than ours? Do you want a sales tax? Do you want alcohol-related crime to increase? Is it that you want more of the alcohol profit to go towards lining the pockets of very large corporations? Sure, let Costco and Walmart flood Oregon with cheap booze. Put even more small business operators out of business. Sure, our communities are mostly pretty small, but what the heck, let a dozen or two gas stations in every town sell vodka! What could go wrong? I am sure the OLCC could be run more efficiently. But what is the point of removing one of the few agencies that puts money into, instead of taking it out of, the State at this time? Money we need for roads, schools and help for the many Oregon unemployed? Sure, let Oregon take one more step towards being just like all those others states that are so cool! They have 5 dollar bottles of whiskey!… and suck to live in.
You miss the graft and corruption that comes with the OLCC though. The Liqour stores pay NO BREAKAGE. Say I’m a Liquor store and I drop four cases of bourbon smashing them. The Oregon Tax payer pays for that breakage. My only job is to make 3-8% profit off of booze I sell. Also this leads to massive theft. The Liquor Store on Taylors Ferry and Terwilliger steals thousands and thousands of dollars in Liquor every year through the “Claims System” and then gives away that breakage to employees or the big fat slob that owns the place Bruce drinks it.
In one year they lost 20,000$ worth of booze that the Oregon tax payer paid for.
So you tell me should it stay in business?
yes we should get rid of the olcc because they won’t issue liquor licenses to people with criminal records and stores and bars won’t be able to sell beer to drunks and under age kids with fake ids that will keep a lot of drunk drivers off the road.
really? no hating on the OLCC’s thinly veiled racism? Maybe I didn’t get the memo, but I thought that the way they treated that store on NE MLK was proof positive of their poopy-pants-ness-ity.
The selection of booze in most California stores sucks.
Still Im quite sure a smart person could come in and streamline the business of taxing booze greatly. Maybe an easy solution would be just to provide some oversight? Last i checked they were gestapo partly because no one had any real power over them.
I have personal experience dealing with their insane bureaucracy and their attempts to outlaw dancing. Plan B, the previous tenants at Loveland (2times removed) languished and died unable to sell enough watter and juice at their music venue. They were given the strongest recommendation possible by the judges who were reviewing their case to give them a permit to sell alcohol. After months of going by the books via appeals Plan B was finally poised to get their paperwork settled. The OLCC magistrates decided to not show up to the meeting and thus no action was taken.
Cause drinking and dancing lead to other good times apparently. Fighting that system was the closest i have ever felt to Kevin Bacon.