Birmingham Council passes 'Brunch Bill,' also extends sales tax beyond 2018

The Birmingham City Council, at its regular meeting for Tuesday, April 10, voted 5-0 to adopt a new ordinance allowing on-premise alcohol sales at bars and restaurants in the Magic City starting at 10 a.m. on Sundays.

Diners must currently wait until noon on Sunday to order a mimosa or Bloody Mary.

This amendment to the city code was the council’s response to the so-called “brunch bill” passed on March 26 by the Alabama Legislature and signed by Governor Kay Ivey.

The bill, SB384, allows those earlier Sunday alcohol sales in the city and allow the council to vote on the issue, rather than holding a referendum.

The purpose of the bill is to allow bars and restaurants to serve alcohol throughout the entire time they serve their popular Sunday brunches.

The change strikes down another antiquated “blue law,” will help Birmingham compete for visitors with other cities in the state and region and will increase tax revenue, according to Councilor Hunter Williams, the chairman of the council’s Public Safety Committee.

“We will create extra revenue for city coffers,” Williams said.

Williams drafted the new ordinance, which was approved last week by his committee.

“Alcohol typically accounts for substantial percentage of a restaurant overall sales and the current law only served to hinder a major source of revenue for small local businesses,” Williams said in a council news release last week.

The change was also recommended by Mayor Randall Woodfin, who called the new law "a home run" for the city.

The mayor told the council that tourism was one reason to make the change, but that Birmingham is fast becoming a “foodie town” and that many city residents love brunch.

“I think this is beneficial to the residents of our city as much as it is to tourists,” he said. “It is also a benefit to our small business owners and tax base.”

The “brunch bill” was introduced in the legislature by the Alabama Restaurant and Hospitality Association, according to city attorney Julie Bernard.

Mindy Hanan, president and CEO of the ARHA, told the council that the new ordinance “will create additional jobs and make it more profitable for restaurants to serve brunch.”

Restauants can also make, on average, an additional $25,000 per year with the extra two hours of alcohol sales, meaning more tax revenue, according to Hanan.

Birmingham will also be able to compete with other Alabama cities that have already made such a change, including Mobile, Huntsville and Montrgomery, Hanan said.

This change affects only establishments that are licensed for on-premises consumption, according to Bernard.

The ordinance should go into effect in time for brunch next Sunday, April 15, after being advertised in local newspapers later this week, according to Bernard and city clerk Lee Frazier.

SALES TAX

The council voted 4-1 to readopt and continue the additional one cent per dollar sales tax increase adopted by the city under the Langford administration.

Without the council’s action, the tax would have expired after Dec. 31, 2018.

Mayor Woodfin, City Council President Valerie Abbott and councilors Hunter Williams and Jay Roberson argued in favor of extending the tax, saying that the city badly needed the $32 million in annual revenue it provides.

“This revenue is needed for our entire city,” Woodfin said.

Councilors Lashunda Scales and Sheila Tyson expressed deep concerns that the revenue from the tax has not been used for the priorities it was meant to help fund, including education.

Woodfin asked for their trust and said the money will be used properly, and that transit and education would receive their share.

Roberson expressed his support for Woodfin, who has been in office less than six months.

“We should give this mayor the opportunity to prove himself,” Roberson said.

Scales argued that 85 percent of the city’s budget is salary, and that the budget needs to be “reprioritized.”

However, Woodfin said that the one-cent tax “is needed not so much to keep people employed but to allow them to provide the services residents need every day.’

Scales also said that businesses are leaving the city because of the tax burden.

Roberson said that the city, after making lots of “tough decisions” in recent years to pull itself out of the financial hole, cannot afford to set itself back by allowing the tax to sunset and “losing almost 40 million dollars out of our budget.”

“Business is moving back in,” Roberson said. “Business is prospering.”

Williams, while expressing support for extending the tax, asked Woodfin if he would promise to try to make sure that the city government as a while operate much more efficiently.

Woodfin said that efficiency is one of the “core values” of his administration.

Scales was not convinced. ”I cant take this to the folks in my district one more time,” she said before the vote.

OTHER BUSINESS

As part of its consent agenda, the council also voted to accept two bids from Gillespie Construction of Jasper to do some bridge work.

The council accepted a bid of about $208,000 from Gillespie for the Greensprings Avenue Bridge Repair Project, and a bid of about $187,000 for the 2018 Bridge Maintenance Tree Removal Project.

UPDATE: This post was updated at 1:30 p.m., 4-10-18, to add more from the council's discussion of the sales tax.