Naperville moves ahead with new tavern laws

Naperville moves ahead with new tavern laws

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West Suburban Naperville is moving ahead with a plan to allow bars to stop serving food after 9 p.m. City Councilman Douglas Krause said he spoke out against the plan at Tuesday night’s city council meeting.

“When you drink with no food, it gets absorbed into the body a lot faster. My concern is about over-serving and people being impaired when they leave the establishment going home,” Krause said.

Last weekend second grade teacher Shaun Wild was stabbed to death in a Naperville bar fight. Krause said he worries the new liquor laws will lead to more dangerous behavior and drunk driving. But he said other council members argued it’s too soon after the recent stabbing to change new liquor laws, and made the point that the bar Wild was at was serving food at the time of the incident.

Krause said starting in May, there could be up to 92 bars in Naperville serving alcohol without food after 9 p.m., up from six establishments with this kind of tavern license. Krause said he wants some kind of food available to bar-goers as well as more enforcement by inspectors to ensure businesses are following the law. 

According to Krause, Tuesday night’s council meeting was the last opportunity to reconsider the new liquor laws before having to wait a period of 62 days to bring it up again. The law passed prior to the recent stabbing incident.