Possible new twist to the Moorestown liquor referendum?

An attorney representing the East Gate Shopping Center made a surprise appearance at the Moorestown Township Council meeting and questioned the ordinance regulating liquor licenses in Moorestown. Jeffrey Johnson of Brown and Connery spoke for about 20 minutes prior to the council unanimously approving an ordinance on second reading to sell liquor licenses in the township.

Residents in Moorestown approved a referendum in the November general elections allowing for the sale of liquor licenses only at the Moorestown Mall, owned by Pennsylvania Real Estate Investment Trust. The referendum technically allows liquor licenses to be sold to “indoor shopping complexes” at the tax lot in the SRC zoning district.

Right across the street from the mall is the East Gate Shopping Center, Johnson said, a grouping of shops and restaurants that are in the Moorestown and Mt. Laurel boundaries. East Gate is in the same SRC zone, but does not have an indoor shopping complex so it cannot bid on liquor licenses.

Both of these centers are located within the same SRC zone, Johnson said, so why are the liquor licenses only limited to one shopping center and one owner? It’s creating a monopoly for one group in the township, Johnson said, and could technically constitute illegal spot zoning.

The township can sell six liquor licenses based on its population, Johnson said. PREIT has pledged to purchase four of these for $1 million each, he said, which will each bring in about $150,000 annually in taxes for the township. Why is the township going to let these other two licenses go to waste when they could be sold across the street at the East Gate Shopping Center, Johnson asked.

“Why are you leaving this tax money on the table,” Johnson asked. “There’s a cloud over this issue. There are unreasonable and unlawful restrictions.”

Johnson claimed that no other township in the state has something as restrictive as this liquor license law. By enacting these restrictions in the ordinance, Johnson said the township is effectively banning any other organization outside of PREIT to bid on a license. East Gate, he said, currently maintains several restaurants in the Mt. Laurel section of its center that have liquor licenses.

Moorestown Township Solicitor Thomas Coleman said it would be “presumptuous” for the East Gate Shopping Center to think that Moorestown won’t sell all six of its possible liquor licenses.

Throughout the process, Coleman has maintained that the state and the alcoholic beverage control have said the referendum and its restrictions are legal.

Mayor John Button said the same at the meeting Monday night. The council did its homework prior to the vote, he said, and is confident that the restrictions and the referendum are legal.

“I understand that he expressed a concern on behalf of his clients in East Gate. The effort to get alcohol approved in Moorestown was an initiative led entirely by PREIT. It was their money and their initiative that got this done,” Button said. “The perception was that alcohol had failed in the past, so confining it to a location where people could understand that it wouldn’t be all over town was a good thing, and voters agreed. We have done everything required by law and everything appropriately. On that basis, I feel that we’re on the right track and prepared to move forward.”