House defeats Kriesel-backed Sunday liquor sales measure

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Efforts to allow liquor stores to open on Sundays failed Friday in the Minnesota House.

A proposed amendment by Rep. Steve Drazkowski, R-Mazeppa, to an otherwise routine liquor-related bill failed 97-25. An attempt by Rep. John Kriesel, R-Cottage Grove, to allow border county stores to sell liquor on Sundays failed 99-21.

“You will go across the river and see them piling up ... on Sundays,” Drazkowski said.

Not everyone agreed.

“There is nobody crying for Sunday liquor sales,” Rep. Kerry Gauthier, DFL-Duluth, said.

Gauthier’s community is next to Wisconsin, which does allow Sunday sales. Rep. Morrie Lanning, R-Moorhead, said he is in a similar situation next to North Dakota, but his stores have not asked for Sunday sales.

“They believe their costs would go up,” Lanning said, because stores would be forced to be open another day.

Drazkowski, however, said the state is losing $145 million to other states.

Kriesel said he only has heard one argument against Sunday sales: “It has been that way forever.”

Rep. David Dill, DFL-Crane Lake, said he does not drink, but supports Sunday sales. “You don’t have to go down, just because the liquor store is open, and buy a beer.”

The overall bill, which easily passed, included a provision like in a Senate bill to allow beer sales at the University of Minnesota football stadium.

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