Booze News

Liquor Authority Says It Was a Very Good Year

Yesterday State Liquor Authority Chairman Dennis Rosen updated members of the New York State Assembly on the Authority’s improvement efforts and revealed that although the notorious backlog of liquor license applications has been eliminated upstate, where applications are processed in 30 days, it still exists downstate, where “licenses are being approved generally in three to five months, which is about eight months faster than they were a year and a half ago.” Other fun facts: The SLA has taken in over $43.5 million in revenue this year, equating to over $800,000 per employee (the Authority’s staff was cut by 15 percent in the past year). And here’s the skinny on enforcement along the lines of that Four Loko raid.

Our Enforcement Unit opened 3,599 and closed 3,906 cases in 2010. It also participated in 112 joint actions/stings as well as conducting scores of trainings throughout the state. These efforts led to the termination of 476 licenses, 121 license suspensions, and 16 Emergency Orders of Summary Suspensions in 2010. In addition, with a staff of eight lawyers, the SLA imposed $7,028,375 in penalties for the calendar year thus far, equating to about $900,000 per attorney.

According to Rosen, the Authority will probably end up with a $1 million budget surplus — so take heart, everyone who’s waiting for a liquor license! You can read Rosen’s testimony below.

Testimony of Chairman Dennis Rosen, New York State Liquor Authority [SLA]

Liquor Authority Says It Was a Very Good Year