Part of the challenge in PB is that commercial rents near the beach are so high that there are only two business models that have a decent chance of succeeding (given the demographics of PB near the beach):
1. applying tattoos
2. serving liquor
The non-alcohol, non-tattoo businesses that have been in PB long-term most likely own their property. I know of one business owner along Garnet who bought several commercial condos 20 yrs ago and continues to operate a business in one of them. His rent is $0 so he doesn’t have to apply tattoos or serve liquor to stay in business.
I find this issue interesting. The cost of doing business near the beach encourages alcohol. The last count I saw on liquor licenses in PB was 428 (if I remember correctly) – that’s a lot of businesses selling alcohol in a small area! The more alcohol we have near the beach the more issues we have with drunks.
Potential solutions:
– tax alcohol consumption – $1 per cover charge and $0.50 per shot served sounds good to me
– prohibit alcohol service and tattoo parlors via zoning
– institute rent control
– tax commercial property owners who choose to rent to alcohol serving or tattoo applying businesses – or require a new monthly permit fee for these property owners – there is some fairness here IMO since the high rents are part of the problem – note that this tax / permit is just a twist on rent control
None of these solutions are ‘free market’ which I profess to believe in. I wonder what a truly free market solution would be to the issue of alcohol in PB – would alcohol take over, go away or find some happy medium?
