MARIETTA, Ga. — Several Marietta Square business owners are banding together to push city leaders to consider creating an open container district for the city. And a city council committee may be ready to take another look at the issue soon.
"We have to compete for getting people to come to Marietta. This one little ordinance really, really could help us quite a bit,” Gary Leake, owner of Johnnie MacCracken’s Celtic Firehouse Pub on the Square, tells WSB Radio.
Ordinances to create the districts have passed in the last year in Smyrna, Kennesaw, as well as Powder Springs - which just approved theirs this week. Most are similar, allowing patrons of restaurants, breweries and bars, to walk within a certain area of a city with cups of alcohol in approved cups – typically 16-ounces.
Ever since the idea of an open container district died in a city of Marietta committee last summer, Square business owners have upped the pressure. "They're outspoken, and they're out making phone calls and they're saying 'hey, we really need this,” says Leake.
He says the moves of Powder Springs and Kennesaw to approve such ordinances are great for them, but those cities need them for a different reason. "These other towns aren't competition. They're sort of a little bit desperate to try to get something jump-started.”
Marietta, Leake says, is competing with the likes of Alpharetta, Atlanta, Roswell, and the newcomer in The Battery – the development around the Atlanta Braves’ SunTrust Park. "The Battery opening up - they didn't create 40 million dollars worth of food and beverage - they stole it. They didn't create it. They stole it from Atlanta, they stole it from Marietta, they stole it from all over the place,” Leake says.
He also insists the idea of patrons free walking with cups of alcohol in hand – is getting a bad rap from some in conservative-leaning Marietta. "There's still this old-fashioned image - and it's not from old people - it's from some of the younger ones that have moved in here that have this image that there's going to be young people drunk on the Marietta Square,” says Leake. I think they have to give people a little more credit, is that we have this incredible group of people moving here."
Leake says new city residents – many monied and older – want the atmosphere that’s been cultivated in Roswell and some other places.
LISTEN TO WSB RADIO’S FULL INTERVIEW WITH GARY LEAKE BELOW:
At least one Marietta city councilmember is hearing that call. "Times are changing. We need to look at what keeps businesses in Marietta, what leads to more development in Marietta economically, keeping the look and feel of Marietta historically, but we don't want to get stuck in the past,” councilwoman Cheryl Richardson tells WSB.
Richardson adds, "We're getting this coming to us from the business owners. I've been contacted by the restaurant association, so now we're getting some people coming to us who are behind this, who want to help build the legislation or the ordinance that frames this correctly."
Richardson says she wants to get more input from residents of the city, and is ready to revisit the issue.
What she knows for sure – she wants to protect a signature aspect of Marietta’s Square – the heart of the city’s downtown. “If we're going to do this, how we leave that park (Glover Park) that sits in the center, open and available for families, who don't necessarily want the person sitting next to their child possibly drinking.
“We're going to definitely look at Glover Park as a place where we don't want this."
Richardson says finding a compromise would strike the best chord, including limiting an open container district to a block of hours every day.
LISTEN TO WSB’S FULL INTERVIEW WITH RICHARDSON BELOW:
Johnnie MacCrackens’ owner Leake is fine with that. "What we're really talking about here is late at night, and especially on the weekends where we really need the business here."
Leake has been a business owner on the Square for 30 years – the last 16 with his pub. He lauds what the city does great, “events that bring people together, family values, things like that." Adding this extra piece would make a difference he says.
Councilwoman Richardson says she is working now to put together a proposal that would be placed on the city’s judicial legislative committee agenda at the end of March.