Liquor issue may return to ballot: Sept. 6 deadline for petitions
Failing by a mere 10 votes two years ago, an initiative to legalize liquor sales in the city may resurface this November.
According to Election Administrator Donna Yates, pro-liquor forces have until Sept. 6 to submit petitions to the election commission to get the question on the Nov. 5 ballot. To call for a referendum on the question, Yates said a petition bearing the names and legal addresses of 215 registered McMinnville voters must be received by the commission. In 2000, the number of names barely beat the filing deadline.
“We’ll need time to validate all the names on the list, so it would be a good idea to get more than the 215 just in case,” Yates said. “I’ve heard there are already some petitions circulating out there, but we haven’t heard anything official yet.”
To pass, the question must first be placed on the ballot by petition and then be approved by a simple majority of McMinnville voters. County voters, meaning those living outside the city limits, will not have a say in the issue. If passed, liquor could only be sold within the city limits by permit.
The 10-vote margin in the November 2000 referendum was the closest legalized liquor had ever come in McMinnville. Historically, voters had shot down the question two-to-one in votes during the 1980s. Legalized liquor led at the polls in 2000 until the early votes were counted, carrying nine of the 11 precincts but failing by 150 votes in early voting.
The anti-liquor group, Citizens for a Safer Community (CSC), spent $3,688 – more than both mayoral candidates combined that year – to get out its anti-liquor message. Pro-liquor forces never officially spent any money during the 2000 referendum.
Should liquor make the ballot, it will be voted on during the Nov. 5 election which will also include a state-wide referendum on the lottery. The referendums will coincide with several other political races including elections for governor, both state houses, U.S. congress and U.S. senate.