While state lawmakers are still hung up over how to cancel the pensions of legislators convicted of felonies, among other end-of-session issues, they have agreed to extend the hours each week that New Yorkers can legally drink at bars and restaurants.
New Yorkers will now be able to order a drink with their brunch, or in some cases, breakfast, at bars and restaurants on Sunday mornings. The current law forbids alcohol sales before noon on Sunday. But when Governor Andrew Cuomo signs the bill into law, alcohol will be available two hours earlier.
Assembly sponsor Robin Schimminger of Buffalo opposed the original bill, which would have allowed liquor to be served starting at 8 a.m. every Sunday. He explained the compromise measure on the floor.
“This bill allows sales on Sunday morning, beginning at 10 a.m. statewide,” Schimminger said.
Bar and restaurant owners can apply for permits to serve alcohol beginning at 8 a.m. on some Sundays if there’s a special reason, like a football game played in Europe that is several hours ahead of the United States.
Not everyone was pleased. Assemblyman Charles Barron of Brooklyn said the needs of church-goers are being ignored.
“I’m getting politically intoxicated by all of these alcohol bills that come out of the economic development committee,” Barron said, who added he wants another way of creating jobs that “doesn’t involve alcohol.”
Barron joked that he was going to start a prohibition movement.
Other Brooklyn Assembly members, who represent a borough undergoing intense gentrification, said the measure aggravates a growing problem. Assemblywoman Annette Robinson said bars are springing up near neighborhood churches, and partiers getting drinks on a Sunday morning might disturb quieter residents going to religious services.
“Every time that I go back home, there’s another bar coming up around the corner,” Robinson complained. “What is our focus, in terms of communities and families as opposed to bars and alcohol?”
Assembly Majority Leader Joe Morelle, who represents the Rochester area, supports the 10 a.m. sales. Morelle said the Sunday sales limits are part of old outdated blue laws begun by the Puritans in colonial America.
“The laws are a vestige of the 17th or 18th century,” Morelle said. “It involves a preference for a religious observance.”
But Morelle said Sunday is not everybody’s Sabbath.
“In upstate New York, we have many facilities who would like to entertain families for brunch in the morning,” Morelle said.
The bill was approved, 106-21. It was earlier approved in the Senate, 62-0.
The measure also eases some regulations for brewers of craft beer, cider and distilleries, as well as wineries.
But those who drink too much at Sunday brunch will have to be careful driving home; the legislature is unlikely to pass a bill allowing ride-sharing services like Uber and Lyft to operate outside New York City.