Owners of dessert lounge That Sugar Vault has asked City of Powell River council to intervene on their behalf after city staff placed limits on the venue’s hours of operation.
Dessert lounge owner Amy Sharp was at the Thursday, July 7, council meeting as her business partner Kaden Webb presented to the councillors.
Council passed a motion to direct staff to reconsider the conditions of the business’ licence.
According to the presentation, the owners are concerned about restrictions, particularly the lounge’s hours of operation, which only allow for liquor sales during its special-occasion liquor (SOL) licence parties between 8-10 pm.
“I would like to be given the opportunity to be proven innocent before being considered guilty,” said Sharp about what she considers onerous restrictions that have not been applied to other similar businesses.
The city issued the six-month temporary business licence on June 30, the day before That Sugar Vault was to hold its first SOL licensed party.
According to city director of planning services Thomas Knight, who approves business licences, a total of five restrictions have been placed on the dessert lounge’s operation.
These include provisions for increased security, that the business not be licensed as a restaurant/banquet hall, that liquor sales end at 10 pm during SOLs and that patron parking is restricted to Crossroads Village Shopping Centre parking lot.
Knight said the provisions are partly due to previous events organized by Sharp, including Beer on the Pier, a licensed outdoor craft beer event with live music that took place on the Wharf at Westview.
“These are totally unusual, but are based on the situation we had with the last Beer on the Pier, where they had people running all over the ferry causeway,” said Knight. “It was totally mismanaged.”
While Sharp admitted there was less security at the two-day event than what she planned for, she added that there were not any mishaps during the event.
“Nothing happened that was an issue,” said Sharp. “Tom might be feeling a little bit of heat from council as to why he has put these restrictions on us.”
Knight agreed that restrictions placed on the lounge are more onerous than other clubs or organizations that may be planning a fundraiser event and wish to sell alcoholic beverages, but said it is due to Sharp’s “history.”
Knight added that his department receives daily emails from concerned neighbours near That Sugar Vault’s location at Crossroads Village Shopping Centre.
Sharp and Webb told council their original idea to get a liquor-primary license may need to be changed to a food-primary license in order to expedite the process and cut down on costs. She said the pushback she is getting from city staff is due to neighbours’ complaint, she said.
“I just really think the neighbours have irritated the city, the council, the RCMP and the liquor board so much that they are trying to do anything to appease them,” said Sharp.
Knight said the problem is rooted in the fact that the lounge is trying to skirt the rules and operate as a bar before it is licensed to do so.
Where the lounge “got really off the rails,” according to Knight, is when owners began taking out special-occasion liquor licences while going through the process of securing a regular liquor license. “Now we’ve got a problem,” he said.
“If the business was already a concern to people having applied for a liquor-primary licence, then they really got people on edge with one special event after the other,” said Knight.
Sharp said hosting special-occasion events while waiting for the full licence was part of the lounge’s business plan from the start.
“Our interest is being a venue available to various non-profit entities and weddings to have their events at; that was part of our business model while we’re wading through the very long process of being licensed,” said Sharp.
Sharp added she would like to see more fairness in the process. She said a business two units down hosts Martinis for a Cause annually and That Sugar Vault is aiming to do similar events.
The decision on That Sugar Vault’s liquor license rests with the BC Liquor Control and Licensing Branch, not with city council. A city review of the business’ operation is scheduled for the first week of September.
