John Scarffe, Nederland.  The Nederland Board of Trustees approved a 3.2 percent Liquor License application for Smoker Friendly during a regular meeting at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, October 16, 2018, in the Nederland Community Center. The board also heard about increasing costs for the Eco Pass program.

Town Clerk Hope Jordan said the Cigarette Shop, d.b.a., Smoker Friendly, has applied for a Colorado 3.2 percent Liquor License. The Cigarette Shop is a Colorado Corporation Company in good standing with the State of Colorado. The proper fees have been remitted to the town, and the applicants are in legal possession of the property in virtue of a lease dated November 1, 2002.

The property is in compliance with public works water regulations, fire, safety and zoning ordinances, rules and regulations and is in compliance with the 500-foot distance prohibition regarding public or parochial school, or the principal campus of any university or seminary. Individual history records have been summited by Terrence Gallagher, Mary Szarmach, Daniel Gallagher, Michael Gallagher, who are the owners of the Cigarette Corporation, and they have submitted fingerprints to the police department.

Results of the background investigation have not yet been received. Town staff recommended that the Board of Trustees review the Cigarette Corporation’s completed application for a 3.2 percent Retail Liquor License.

Brandon Sanders, attorney, along with Danial Gallagher, said the applicant is of good moral character, and the town has an interest in this. Sanders introduced Max Scott, who owns and operates Oedipus. In its 50th business year, its primary focus is petition surveys on local licenses. The company has done 6,000 in the state.

The company was hired for payment in advance and generated petition documents with Nederland staff. The petition allows people to say if they are for or against the liquor license, and they could sign the petition.

Oedipus did a much larger sampling than usual and did 151 door knocks.

The results are 90 percent in favor of the license. Three were against due to abhorrence of alcohol, and four were opposed for miscellaneous reasons.

The company also generates research of traffic data, Scott said. The Peak to Peak Highway is the closest to the business location, with 405 cars on Highway 119. Move south, and the count is 7,900 and 7,100 cars, which is a pretty substantial traffic flow. About 7,100 individuals live in the area. “The Survey results are in favor of issuing the license,” Scott said.

Mayor Pro-Tem Julie Gustafson said she would like to see in writing what the question was. Scott explained that the top part of the petition addresses the kind of license being applied for. The petition need is discussed, and it explains why the license is being applied for.

Mayor Kristopher Larsen said these are great numbers, but they are irrelevant. They are kind of meaningless. Daniel Gallagher said he is the owner of Smoker Friendly and operates stores in five states.

Colorado is his home state, and it is a Boulder County company. It’s a convenience and tobacco store. His lease goes to the end of the year and will be extended. Hours are 6 a.m. to 9 p.m.

His employees live in the Nederland area. The license will be for off-premise beer sales and won’t be consumed on the property, Gallagher said. He has several training programs for staff, who will go through a state training program.

“We operate six full liquor stores. We have had violations, and the company policy is immediate termination for underage sales and then full training for the whole staff,” Gallagher said. His store in Fort Collins has a liquor license and has had no violations since 1995.

Gustafson said it seems like there was a pattern of violations. Gallagher said he had several violations with his five liquor stores in Nebraska. Three of the seven have had violations. “I don’t think we have a large number.”

Trustee Jonathan Baumhover said that Nederland does have an adequate number of liquor stores but he doesn’t see a reason to say no. Trustee James Rawsthorne said that Smoker Friendly has a good business here and he thinks the petition is compelling.

Trustee Kristen Conrad said she has never heard a single complaint against this business. Gustafson said she is concerned about whether people really read the petition. “I don’t see a legal reason that this license shouldn’t be awarded. My concerns are not alleviated regarding previous violations. We do reserve the right to revoke a license. I wish you well with it.”

The board approved Smoker Friendly’s 3.2 percent Liquor License.

Scott Ptach, president of the Eco Pass Board, presented an update on the program. RTD has switched to a utilization-based contract model, which affects the Eco Pass contract price substantially. The Eco Pass board is working on figuring out how to move forward and might need to re-set the members of the program to get the correct number of Eco Passes at-large.

“We might need to charge for Eco Passes to cover the difference. Any other thoughts the Board of Trustees has would be most helpful,” states background. The Eco Pass program will cease to exist come 2021.

Ptach told the board that every Eco Pass is scanned and totaled up, and that’s what the program pays for. “Our contract price is based on the last full year of data. That contract is based on 2017 utilization.”

The program has been given a little bit of a grace period. They will go from a $96,000 contract to $372,000, so the contract is going up 20 percent in 2019. “Our biggest problem is the third year. That’s the full initiation of the $372,000,” Ptach said.

During the past year and a half, town staff members have been getting organized. They don’t know how many people have moved to Denver and are still using the pass, but 41 percent is an add number for local riders.

Nederland contracts with Boulder County, and Boulder County contracts with RTD for that route. The board is working on trying to figure out how to go forward without impacting the town too much, and how do we get this program re-set. “We pay the town 10 percent to administer it. RTD has given us vague numbers,” Ptach said.

Trustee Dallas Masters asked if RTD can disable the pass after a year, and then have to re-verify - a complete reset of all of them. Ptach said it’s a lot to have people come in and re-verify.

The Town could start with the oldest passes out there, Ptach said. “We have tenants and homeowner who can have passes. We are almost at a full year with 2018 passes. Most tenants are on the list.”

Staff could go through public records for homeownership and not turn off those passes, and then for everyone else, they would turn those passes off and those people will have to re-verify. There are 1,700 passes out there.

That already puts us into next year and is a full-time job.

Town Administrator Karen Gerrity said staff needs to allocate 20 minutes per re-verify. “We would have to come up with a different program, or do something on line, but it’s going to come down to people coming into Town Hall and giving them proof of residence. It would take more than a year to do everybody.”

Trustee Kristen Conrad asked how we could communicate that some of us get our passes through our employers, and Rawsthorne suggested a small fee to encourage people to use their employers’ passes. Ptach said that the ballot language may stipulate that we can’t charge a fee.

Larsen said that it sounds like Ptach is working with town staff to come up with some solutions. Ptach said they could possibly hire an auditor to take some of the work load off of the staff.

Masters said they should reset the program before 2019, so the 2019 number will be accurate. Someone organized it when the program first started, and people came in and got their pictures taken and then got their passes in the mail.

(Originally published in the October 25, 2018, print edition of The Mountain-Ear.)