Belize City to Debate Future of Bars and Nightclubs

If you live near a bar, nightclub, or open-air establishment, you may have had to deal with late-night noise, heavy traffic, or questions about how those businesses got licensed in the first place. Now, government says it wants to hear directly from you. Next week, the Ministry of Local Government will bring its nationwide liquor licensing consultation to Belize City, where residents, business owners, and other stakeholders will get a chance to weigh in on proposed changes to laws that have been largely untouched for more than a hundred years. The discussions will look at noise pollution, operating hours, licensing categories, enforcement, and how open-air establishments should be regulated. Officials say the goal is to modernize the system and strike a better balance between business activity and community peace. Director of Local Government Clifford King explains.

 

Clifford King, Director, Local Government

“We know that the consumption of – the sale and consumption of liquor is a contributing factor to a lot of the societal problems we’re having, whether it is road traffic accidents, domestic violence, poverty offenses, sexual offenses, labor offenses. So we know what the problems are and we now have to bring those realities into a discussion framework. But you will also know that in that application there are lots of challenges, whether it is with the license types, the license categories, the fees for the different categories of licenses, whether it is in the governance or administration, how the boards are appointed, who become board members, penalties, enforcement issues, the correlation to noise pollution, the playing of loud music. All of those things have created – are creating some challenges for us as a society. We’re getting a significant level of contributions, albeit from a very small list of attendees. People don’t come to public meetings, my brother. And so – but they are speaking on some critical issues, and I think what they’re speaking on represents a lot of the societal views. Please come out, give your inputs, seek your clarification. Even in the current framework, if you’re not clear about certain things, ask questions. And I want to say very clearly that we don’t want complaints. We want to hear them, but we want solutions. We want to hear what are the recommendations.”

 

The consultation in Belize City for liquor license reform is set for six p.m. on Tuesday, July 28th, at the House of Culture.

 

Attention readers: This online newscast is a direct transcript of our evening television broadcast. When speakers use Kriol, we have carefully rendered their words using a standard spelling system.

 

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