As part of its ongoing discussion concerning alcohol rules in the town, the Signal Mountain Town Council is discussing regulations for serving alcohol at events at the Mountain Arts Community Center.
Currently, a $250 permit must be obtained for each event where alcohol is served, and there must be a certified bartender even if there’s no bar; for example, serving wine at a wedding.
Under the town’s current regulations, nonprofits hosting fundraisers are treated as businesses, with the same regulations applying to them as to caterers serving alcohol at a birthday party or wedding, Town Manager Boyd Veal told councilors at their Aug. 12 meeting. Due to the cost of following those regulations, the return is not enough to make alcohol sales make sense for nonprofit fundraisers, he said.
With the MACC being town-owned, certain additional regulations apply to the sale of alcohol there, but Veal said the state wouldn’t care one way or another if a nonprofit or an instructor wanted to have wine at an event or class since it wouldn’t involve a for-profit business.
“It boils down to our comfort level and what do we want or not want,” he said of non-businesses serving alcohol at the MACC.