MBDA is committed to challenging the proliferation of alcohol sales from locations such as convenience stores and grocery stores where liquid fuel is sold. MBDA recently filed a petition to challenge the issuance of a restaurant liquor license to a Sheetz convenience store in Shippensburg and we are waiting for the case to be scheduled for a hearing. Other MBDA members filed challenges to a liquor license application filed by Giant Food Stores for a grocery store in Mechanicsburg that also sells gasoline. We believe the Commonwealth Court’s decision in the Weis case could have a significant impact on these other legal challenges.
We need your help!
We are asking our members to be vigilant about looking for new applications by grocery stores or convenience stores where liquid fuel may be sold. The more common this structure becomes, the harder it will be to persuade the Commonwealth Court to reverse this unauthorized action by the PLCB. The only way to monitor filings by convenience stores, grocery stores and others for liquor licenses is to be watchful for public hearing notices (for inter-municipal license transfer requests) and PLCB notice placards posted in your community. PLCB regulations require that applicants for new liquor licenses or for the transfer or extensions of these licenses must post notice of the filing. The posting must be in the form required by the PLCB, which is a bright orange notice placard. Since the purpose of notice posting is to notify the public that an application has been filed with the PLCB, regulations require the PLCB placard must be posted at or near the main entrance to the premises in a conspicuous place where it can be readily observed by the public. In the case of a vacant lot, posting must be on a post or stake of permanent material, at the midpoint of the largest boundary fronting on a public thoroughfare at a point not more than 10 feet from the sidewalk (or roadway in the absence of a sidewalk).