If lawmakers don’t allow full-strength beer and wine in grocery stores during the upcoming legislative session, voters could get a shot to approve it on the 2010 ballot.
Blake Harrison, a state House candidate and a Denver deputy district attorney, this week submitted a ballot initiative to let grocery and convenience stores dedicate 5 percent of their floor space to wine and full- strength beer. A quarter of that space must be dedicated to smaller producers under a draft that gets its first hearing before legislative legal council Dec. 1.
Liquor-store owners, who turned out in droves to defeat a similar proposal during the 2009 session, could in turn use 5 percent of their floor space for snack items.
Harrison, who also backed a failed 2002 initiative to allow Sunday sales of liquor, wrote the proposal so that any legislation passed in 2010 would supersede it. Jessica Fender, The Denver Post
