SAUK VILLAGE VOTES TO INCREASE AVAILABLE LIQUOR LICENSES

At a recent meeting of the Sauk Village Board of Trustees a motion was introduced to approve an ordinance amending chapter six, alcoholic beverage establishments, section 30, number of licenses, of the Sauk Village Municipal Code. The ordinance, which passed with a 4-2 vote, will increase the number of class R-3 liquor licenses allowed in Sauk Village to seven.
At a recent meeting of the Sauk Village Board of Trustees a motion was introduced to approve an ordinance amending chapter six, alcoholic beverage establishments, section 30, number of licenses, of the Sauk Village Municipal Code. The ordinance, which passed with a 4-2 vote, will increase the number of class R-3 liquor licenses allowed in Sauk Village to seven.

Sauk Village Votes to Increase Available Liquor Licenses

BY KATHERINE NEWMAN

At a recent meeting of the Sauk Village Board of Trustees, a motion was introduced to approve an ordinance amending chapter six, alcoholic beverage establishments, section 30, number of licenses, of the Sauk Village Municipal Code. The ordinance, which passed with a 4-2 vote, will increase the number of class R-3 Liquor Licenses allowed in Sauk Village to seven.

The increase in R-3 Liquor Licenses might also mean an increase in establishments that operate video gaming terminals in the community.

As defined in section one of the Illinois Gaming Act, a video gaming terminal is any electronic devices that, upon insertion of money, are available to play a video game, including but not limited to video poker, line up, and blackjack, utilizing a video display and microprocessors in which the player may receive free games or credits that can be redeemed for cash. The term does not include a machine that directly dispenses coins, cash, or tokens or is for amusement purposes only.

A precondition for holding a video gaming license in the state of Illinois is that each licensed establishment shall possess a valid liquor license at the time of application and at all times thereafter during which a video gaming terminal is made available to the public for play at that location, according to section 55 of the Illinois Gaming Act.

Sauk Village Trustee Bernice Brewer voted against the ordinance and spoke out at the meeting to state that she thought the increase was a bad idea.

“I think seven is a little excessive for this town and considering the kind of businesses that are here and the demographics, I think it would be a bad idea and I think seven is too many. I’m not saying that gaming is not a good lucrative business, but seven is too many for Sauk Village,” said Brewer. “I only see a lot of trouble coming.”

During the Meeting Sauk Village Trustee, Beth Zupon, presented her own findings based on data from the Illinois Gaming Board’s Video Gaming Report. The Video Gaming Report shows how many establishments offer video gaming in any Illinois municipality, how many video gaming terminals each establishment has, and how much revenue is generated from the video gaming terminals.

As stated in the board meeting, Zupon found that the average number of establishments with video gaming terminals in the communities surrounding Sauk Village was seven.

Nearby, the Village of Glenwood currently has seven video gaming establishments that generated $37,080.34 in revenue for the municipality from Jan. to April, according to the Video Gaming Report.

“If you look at all of these municipalities, there is a lot of money. There is revenue made and we need revenue. When we sat down for six hours and went through every line item in our budget and every expenditure we saw that we need revenue. While I’m not the biggest fan of these things, they are generating revenue and that’s why my vote is yes,” said Zupon.

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