‘Dry’ Nevada town ends decades-old alcohol ban

PIOCHE — Businesses in the small town of Alamo will soon be able to sell alcohol after the Lincoln County Commission on Tuesday repealed its nearly four-decade-old prohibition law.

The five commissioners voted unanimously to accede to the wishes of the town’s board, which also approved a plan to end its 1985 “dry” ordinance last October by a 5-0 margin.

The future of commerce was the main concern for the unincorporated jurisdiction populated mainly by members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, whose religion generally frowns on the consumption of alcoholic beverages.

“You don’t have to buy it if you don’t want to drink it,” Commissioner Janine Woodworth said.

Leaders of the town, on U.S. Highway 93 about 95 miles north of Las Vegas, want its top businesses, the Great Basin Foods supermarket with its Sinclair gas station, to survive amid the area’s changing economic climate, which includes alcohol sales, town board Chairman Vern Holaday said.

“We’re doing it to keep a level playing field with the businesses outside of town,” Holaday told the commission. “It’s not like there’s going to be a bar in every corner in town.”

Residents took notice last year when the Las Vegas-based Green Valley Grocery chain, which owns a small market offering alcohol 7 miles away in Ash Springs, started to build a larger outlet there and acquired a 10-acre former truck stop just across Alamo’s border on U.S. 95 within sight of Great Basin Foods, according to Holaday.

The chain would like to add a motel, gas station and other amenities to the site in addition to another Green Valley store with liquor sales and plenty of parking for trucks that traverse the highway, he said.

The county’s District Attorney Dylan Frehner said that the new “wet” law for Alamo would have to be signed and published to become effective, probably in about 30 days.

Holaday said that applicants for liquor licenses would still have to jump through regulatory hoops, first by complying with state and county regulations on alcohol and then winning permissions from the county and town for licenses and zoning changes in order to offer alcohol.

“Nothing is zoned in the town right now to be able to put a bar in,” he said.

Because county law does not permit alcohol sales within 1,500 feet of a church, school or other alcohol business, and Alamo stretches just about a mile across, booze establishments could not be located on the town’s streets, he said.

The town might revive a years-old proposal to expand its borders, possibly giving it more space for new businesses, he said.

Holaday, who owns the Alamo Inn motel in town, said he does not plan to sell alcohol there.

Contact Jeff Burbank at jburbank@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0382. Follow him @JeffBurbank2 on Twitter.