NOVEMBER GAMBLING VOTE LIKELY; CITY COUNCIL OKAYS SUNDAY LIQUOR SALES

Voters in Cape Girardeau likely will have an opportunity Nov. 2 to reconsider riverboat gambling.

At Monday's city council meeting, proponents of the measure calling themselves "The Yes Group" presented petitions with signatures of 3,720 citizens requesting the measure be placed on the November ballot. The number of signatures needed to force another election is 2,254.

In other business Monday, the council gave emergency final approval to a law allowing Sunday packaged liquor sales in the city.

Voters in the city earlier this month rejected riverboat gambling by a vote of 5,506 to 4,940, but immediately after the vote proponents began gathering the signatures needed to compel another election.

Mayor Gene Rhodes said the council would refer the petitions to Cape Girardeau County Clerk Rodney Miller for verification.

The council also unanimously approved a motion by Councilman Al Spradling III to place the ballot issue on the agenda for the July 6 meeting should there be sufficient valid signatures. Final approval for placing riverboat gambling on the November ballot would then go on the agenda for the council's July 19 meeting.

Chuck McGinty, a downtown businessman, said proponents of riverboat gambling learned soon after the June 8 election that many of their brethren failed to vote.

He said he heard repeatedly from supporters that, "I thought it was so obvious that this issue was a done deal, I didn't bother to vote."

According to local elections officials, McGinty said, more people registered to vote in Cape Girardeau during the past nine days than registered during the entire year of the last presidential election.

The Sunday liquor sales issue was given an emergency reading after Rhodes read a letter from state officials claiming the city has no authority to supplant a new state law allowing Sunday liquor sales.

The letter was signed by J.T. Taylor, deputy supervisor of the Missouri Division of Liquor Control; Brent Butler and Ralph Kidd, with the state's legislative research division; and Dave Hanson, an assistant at the Missouri attorney general's office.

City Attorney Warren Wells said he also has discussed the matter with the attorney general's office and that, based on similar case law, the state statute "overrides" any city law prohibiting Sunday sales.

Councilman David Limbaugh suggested the council give emergency final approval to the ordinance. Typically, city laws must receive three readings at two different meetings before final approval.

Councilman Mary Wulfers asked Wells when Sunday liquor sales would be legal if the council failed to give emergency reading to the law. "Arguably, it already is (legal)," Wells said.

Limbaugh also questioned whether the city should impose the full $300 license fee authorized by the state. "Shouldn't it be designed to cover our administrative costs?" he asked.

David Barklage, who owns the Spanky's convenience stores in Cape Girardeau and is a former city councilman, also encouraged the council to review the fee.

Barklage said the city liquor license already costs $150, which would increase to $400. "That's in addition to state, county and federal taxes," he added.

He said the profit margin for packaged liquor sales is slight. "You may have to have $3,000 in sales just to cover this license fee," he said.

But Wulfers said, "Considering what's being sold, I think it's fair."

Also at Monday's meeting, the council agreed to direct Wells to modify a city law that prohibits children from playing in the street.

The most vocal proponent of the change was Councilman Al Spradling III, who said the current law is "petty" because it's rarely enforced.

The issue was brought to the council by a group of citizens who signed a petition asking that the law be repealed to allow playing on city streets.

The petition was signed by 21 residents of the 2800 block of Luce Street in Cape Girardeau. The residents said the law doesn't take into account dead-end streets or cul de sacs, where children playing in the street isn't a pressing safety concern.

But Capt. Steve Strong of the Cape Girardeau Police Department said he would be opposed to changing the ordinance.

"We got a complaint today that was the result of a near accident in which a child was almost hurt," Strong said at the council's study session. "I think this would set a dangerous precedent. It only takes one car at the wrong time."

But Spradling said the ordinance doesn't differentiate between children playing in the streets and bicyclists, "skate-boarders," joggers, and "roller-bladers," who present similar safety concerns.

"If we're going to enforce it, we've got to enforce it on everybody," he said. "From a standpoint of inconsistencies, it doesn't make any sense."

Wells suggested the law be amended so that it applied only in cases where play in the streets actually endangered someone. "I think it could be couched more in terms of a specific danger," he added.

"I think that would be the way to address it," Spradling said.