The state of Tennessee is technically a “dry” state by default, which means that each municipality must amend the laws to allow for alcohol consumption in their county or town. It also means Tennessee does not have state laws to regulate the sale and service of alcohol throughout the state; it is up to a county, town, or establishment to set their terms and conditions for alcohol sales and consumption.

In the town of Altamont, many businesses are licensed to sell beer. One notices that when Altamont Mayor Jana Barrett says the word “alcohol,” by default she is referring to hard liquor. “We enjoy a quiet life in Altamont,” says Barrett, “mainly because we are a dry city inside of a dry county… I vowed that Altamont would not change its allowance of liquor on my watch because I firmly believed honoring your father and mother does not end at the graveyard.”

At the Altamont City Council meeting on November 3, Barrett presented an example ordinance allowing the practice of “brown-bagging” or “bring your own bottle” pertaining to wine and “highgravity” beer into a restaurant, with the intent to vote to either pass an ordinance allowing and regulating the practice, or to altogether prohibit. The example ordinance was created with Altamont’s new hot spot, Firescald, setting the standard where patrons are permitted to bring their own bottle of wine to have with their meal. Barret discloses, “We have made it clear that we don’t want to interfere with what you’re doing. This is for the next person who comes in, and if we don’t do this, they can brown-bag liquor. You’ve made a place where people want to come. Altamont has classed it up and we intend to keep it that way…What this [ordinance] does is gives a clear guideline to future businesses that we expect them to conduct their business as you’ve done.”

Barrett went on to explain, “If we don’t have ordinances that regulate situations like this, that says this is what we expect, then if somebody moves in, they can do anything they want…. And I would like to turn my eyes, turn my back on everything and say just do what you want to do but that was not what I was elected to do…We’ve got a beer license…and I know wine and high gravity beer aren’t much worse than beer… but there will be people who come in and push the envelope…So here is my recommendation: we can prohibit this. We are well in the rights to prohibit it…but every time we prohibit it we’re putting it off and it’s gonna come back…instead of prohibit it we adopt the ordinance that regulates it. That way we’ve got something that protects us when someone comes in later and wants to serve hard liquor: we’re a dry city. Here’s our ordinance.”

The example ordinance Barret had worked on with the attorney included everything that a town could legally regulate, such as alcohol storage and allowable times of service, which raised concern to restaurant owner Kacey Jo Myers, still trying to settle on hours and modes operation between being open to the public as a restaurant, for private events, and as a catering service. When it came time to vote to pass an ordinance to allow or to prohibit the BYOB policy, motions were made and seconded but not carried. Principal did not win over practicality, due to the example ordinance not quite fitting the bill. To vote to pass an ordinance but not the one provided would not produce anything substantiated in the meeting. If they were to pass the example ordinance provided, it would have to go through two formal readings with the council, attorney, and by courtesy, working with the restaurant owner to scan for necessary amendments — a tall order to be completed in the height of holiday festivities. Finally, the motion was made and carried to table the issue until January.