This is a printer-friendly version of an article from Zip06.com.
08/15/2017 03:30 PMGuilford Police recently completed alcohol compliance checks at various establishments in town, looking to see if all businesses were operating in compliance with liquor control laws. Of the seven establishments checked in this round, police said all businesses are currently compliant.
Police conducted the compliance checks along with Connecticut State Department of Consumer Protection Division of Liquor Control and with the support of Guilford Developmental Assets for Youth (DAY). The establishments visited in this check included Augur’s Irish Pub, Ayuthai Restaurant, The Country Tavern, Guilford Mooring, Mr. J Asian Bistro, Sheppard’s Tavern, and Edward A. Norton VFW Post 7666.
Police Chief Jeff Hutchinson said all of the checks are done at random and the absence of an establishment on this list does not mean it’s not in compliance. Hutchinson the department tries to run these checks about once a year to ensure legal compliance and to be sure there is no serving of alcohol to minors and that people are not being over-served.
“In this case, liquor control [agents] and our officers went in and determined number one that we wanted to make sure they were properly displaying their liquor permits, which is necessary for regulatory reasons,” he said. “Then we check for over-serving...and then check to see if there is anyone underage present and then they will make sure that the people working there are the right age and those sorts of things.”
Hutchinson said Guilford DAY supported the department in this effort to curb underage drinking.
“DAY works closely with our department through our liaison who works directly with DAY,” he said. “There are several town-wide initiatives that continually focus on the health of youth through ensuring there’s no underage drinking or substance abuse and this is just one of the initiatives that has been organized and arranged with them.”
Guilford DAY Prevention Coordinator Robyn Sneider said the compliance checks are just one element of the organizations effort to prevent underage drinking in town.
“We have it as one of our action items for our drug-free communities grant and that is to provide merchant education training, which we did back in February, and then to follow up with these compliance checks to see if the merchants that we trained are compliant as a way to ensure that our youth are staying safe and not having easy access to alcohol in our community,” she said.
Sneider said there have been many successful compliance checks in town in previous years, but said she was pleased to see merchants continue to support the effort to prevent the sale of alcohol to minors.
“We are thrilled with these results and believe they send a powerful message: Our community values youth, and our merchants are on board to prevent our youth from accessing alcohol.”
Hutchins said even with a system that appears to be working well, it’s good practice to complete the compliance checks.
“I am not suggesting there is a huge issue with that as evidenced by the full compliance when we did those checks,” he said. “But I think it is important to recognize establishments for supporting that just like we would call them out if they failed—give them credit for doing what they are suppose to do.”