After much discussion about when and how organizations can serve alcohol on the Town Green, the Board of Selectmen (BOS) approved a waiver on June 19 for an exception to the policy for the Guilford Art Center’s (GAC) Craft Expo this July.

Questions were first raised at a BOS meeting over the practice of allowing the serving of alcohol on the Town Green for certain events. This led the board to adopt a policy drafted by Guilford Police Department (GPD) staff at its April 3 meeting. The new policy aims to regulate the location and manner in which alcohol can be served at approved events.

Consuming alcohol on town property is prohibited by town ordinance, but for certain events, the BOS has the power to make an exception if a group applies for the ordinance to be waived. Such an exception was made last year for the Craft Expo on the Green (the first time an exception has been made for the Green, according to First Selectman Joe Mazza), but when the Guilford Art Center submitted a request at a prior BOS meeting to have beer and wine sold at the Craft Expo again this year, the BOS asked GPD to come up with a policy to regulate the sale and consumption of alcohol on the Green.

The policy, which applies to any event on the Green that has received approval from the BOS to waive the ordinance, outlines the area in which alcohol can be served and who can serve.

According to the policy, alcohol can only be served in an area cordoned off from the main event with a single point of entry and exit to prohibit individuals from taking alcohol into the main event space. Individuals serving alcohol have to be Training for Intervention Procedures (TIPS) trained, a type of certification and training acquired by bartenders and other servers that teaches individuals how to spot a fake ID and how to know when an individual has had too much to drink.

The application from the GAC was approved on April 17 after the BOS considered input from the Guilford Green Committee. However, on June 12 the GAC came before the board again to request a waiver to the policy, prompting questions related to precedent and event-specific requests among board members.

The waiver requests that people of all ages be allowed into the cordoned off area so that individuals, regardless of age, may sit together. Maureen Belden of the GAC and Dee Jacob of the Marketplace at the Guilford Food Center—which will be selling food, beer, and wine at the event—presented the request to the BOS. Jacob said all who choose to drink will still be carded and wrist banded, but allowing everyone into the space will permit families to sit together.

“The rationale is people pay an admission fee to come in—they are not coming into a beer garden, they are coming into the art center and the intention of having beer and wine as an accent to the food and the nature of the event,” she said. “Very often the people who come to the Craft Expo come with grandma or little kids or whatever, and some of those people may not have an ID which means persons who care to consume could enter but would have to leave grandma or kids out of that area and would no longer be able to sit together.”

Even with the event-specific modification, Jacob said the ideals of the alcohol policy are still being upheld—alcohol sales and consumption will still be tightly monitored. Guilford Police Chief Jeff Hutchinson, who helped craft the policy, said he can work with this specific request.

“I will work with whatever you guys decide,” he said to the BOS. “The guidelines I provided are not event-specific and my only concern is from the Town’s perspective, if you make exceptions – it is just something to consider where you go with the exceptions.”

Some selectmen said they were comfortable with this waiver as this is the first year of the policy and some said they would like to hear input from the Green Committee on this issue. However, First Selectman Joe Mazza said no input is needed from the Green Committee, as they already weighed in on the policy, and that he is uncomfortable with the precedent of the waiver.

“We have to be very careful…the Expo I am not worried about, it is the next event,” he said. “We have guidelines that we set up and voted on and I think we should stick with them.”

Despite Mazza’s objection, the vote went in favor of the GAC’s waiver request. While the waiver was approved, Selectman Charles Havrda told the GAC to be careful.

“The onus is on you,” he said. “If your event is not successful or in control, we have gone out on a limb.”