Blue Ridge will not dry up and become a ghost town simply because it remains a dry county and this is not an issue of "separation of church and state."

I agree the county should relax this standard because it's losing a lot of tax revenue and...as so many have stated previously...it cannot attract good restuarants.

I understand your passion and dude...I'm with you...but don't kid yourself...people will continue to come to this little neck of the woods because of the mountains. Heck...I wish they would stop coming. My dad was born here...he moved closer to Atlanta for work so I've never lived in BR but I have surely seen it grow way beyond what I would have preferred. As has been discussed on another blog about the river...I wish we could run these rental companies out of business. I would clearly trade them for liquior.

Well the vote didn't go through. So I want to know who flipped? Since one of the council members who was against the measure resigned the odds should have been in favor of "yes". But it looks like someone got to the other council members and persuaded their voting decision. Yard Sales People! Flea Markets for Floridians!

I am from Florida and I hate yard sales. Why don't you do something to annoy the tea-totaling, fire and brim stone pushing population instead of something they might actually like. Try a wet t-shirt contest or something similarly scandalous. I keep praying a Hooters opens up next to Home Depot just to see the reaction. You know the parking lot would be full. Of course beer and wine would have to be allowed for that.

I would rather the Hooters and wet tee shirt contest stay in Florida...we don't want to attract that same crowd to Blue Ridge. Most folks...even those from Florida...want to keep this area a little more peaceful. We (I) don't want bars, sleezy night clubs and half naked folks on every corner. Now I'm not suggesting that liquor will cause that to happen but let's don't encourage it.

I agree...we dont need hooters but if I wanted to open a hooters here I would like the ability to do it...if the county is as much against drinks as they would have you think the business would fail in short order....that said I demand the right to have a beer with my wings...a cold crisp pilsner with my hot pizza...and the luxury of asking the waitstaff to fetch me one...the right to exercise my responsibilites as an adult with out religious hypocrites telling me how to behave while they ignore their religion, esp. commandments 5,7,8,9,10 regularly (since the commandments seem to be popping up all over town). I dont think small towns get sleazy night clubs and half naked folks on every corner...I dont recall sleazy night clubs in key west and that place is all about drinking

__________________
A bad day off road is better than a good day at work.

You all have it ALL WRONG!

The answer to this dillema is SMUT SHOPS - I don't think they can be prevented (only subject to zoning regulations). If the County has NO ZONING then how can they be stopped? - the county and/or city would sure burn through a lot of $$ trying to defend this against one of the well seasoned Atlanta attorneys who specialize in representing all the smut shop and X rated adult novelty shop owners in this stuff. DAwsonville has one of these shops on GA 400 now, so why not one on 515 somewhere? I'm sure they could find a customer base in the area - maybe even some of the people so against serving beer and wine on restaurants would shop there (they just better make sure they have some concealed parking so you can hide your car while shopping - hehehe)

This would make having some upscale restaurants serving glasses of wine to upscale patrons pale in comparision - it would certainly put things more into perspective...

Lets go look at Dahlonega as an example... They have the ability to serve beer, wine AND liquor in all restaurants in the city and the county - I don't see wet tee shirt contests, drunks running rampant, prostitutes on every street corner, or any of the other societial ills that the misguided "don't want no change" crowd seems to throw out time and time again. In fact, I see more of those things going on in Fannin with drug abuse, alcoholism, petty crime (thefts to support drug habits), chronic unemployment and "Scamming the welfare system", more poverty, dog fighting, chicken fighting, illegal trash dumping and littering, etc. etc.

WAKE UP & SMELL THE COFFEE AND GET A CLUE PEOPLE! Until people start to realize that TOURISM is GEORGIA's NUMBER 2 INDUSTRY (after agriculture - which will never be big in Fannin) - and until they realize that Fannin better start doing all it can to roll out the welcome mat to tourists and their $s, the area and many of its families will continue to suffer. Of course, the sad thing is that certain people preaching for no change could really care less.

Well, here comes my opinion. I have lived in Georgia for 23 years and Fannin County has been my home. I moved to the mountains to be away from all the good and bad that city-life has to offer. I am not religious; I drink alcohol on a regular basis. But folks, I do not want to change the laws related to alcohol in Fannin County! You all moved to Fannin County knowing quite well that you could not get a drink...now why did you do that if you wanted to live in a place where you could have one? Why did you not just keep going to Murphy or stay in Ellijay? I like being in a place that is old timey and Mayberryish. Gosh, darn, the quaintness of Blue Ridge is outstanding. Do you really want to make it just like every other little town along the 515 corridor? I don't. I love the uniqueness. The downtown area is as perfect as it gets. Already on weekends though, because of the tourists, I cannot find a place to park so that I can enjoy some of my little town. Or, have you ever tried shopping at Ingles on a Friday afternoon? I work all week, go to Ingles for weekend groceries, and then there are so many tourists that there are no shopping carts! And the fresh fruit and vegetables have been picked through or are completely out. In my humble opinion, we don't need anymore tourists. Frankly, I don't care if the place does dry up...it was fine in 1985 when I moved here. But it will not dry up. Blue Ridge has enough charm to keep people coming whether they can drink alcohol or not. Is it really that important? Alcohol will change the ambiance of our home...more people will come and then there will be more usage of the natural resources and all the things that brought us to North Georgia in the first place. We won't be able to recognize it. I didn't move to Fannin County to change it...I moved here 23 years ago to enjoy it just the way it is, in it's beautiful, singular way.

Sounds pretty selfish to me... I like it this way, so EVERYONE should like it this way. All cities and towns evolve over time - Change is unavoidable... Ellijay and Murphy were "old timey" and "Mayberryish" too (and really still are), but they have decided that the benefits to progressing with the time far outweighed staying stuck in the past. So will Blue Ridge one day (soon hopefully)..
Dahlonega and downtown Ellijay seem to be doing just fine downtown - they have their picturesque charm and don't dry up and blow away when 5 PM hits like Blue Ridge does. Their merchants CAN actually make a good living and the town is attracting QUALITY transplants who have contributions to making the community a better place are coming there.

And the fact of the matter is that SOME of us (in fact a significant number of us) DO actually have a life and like some things to do without being held captive in our homes all the time - that includes having a good place to go eat, have a drink with dinner and spend some money that would cycle back through the community. If anyone wants to live somewhere where progress won't come, why in the heck did you pick North Georgia? ITs on the outskirts of one of the U.S.' fastest growing cities (Atlanta) with another smaller metro area also growing significantly (Chattanooga) - both of these major metro areas WANT continued growth and they will continue to dominate all of the smaller communities around them - seems to me like people would try to make this a positive by creating QUALITY growth that includes tasteful buildings, development and all that goes with it (like many mountain communities have done in Colorado and other places out west). People around here need to get the paper bag off their heads and start looking around the world they live in just a bit more.

I'm right there with you. I have lived here my whole life and can't figure out why the city people come here and then want to change things. It's gotten worse in the past few years. Much worse. We never wanted/needed alcohol and don't now. Let's just enjoy our quiet mountain town and quit wishin' it was different. Thank you.

Thank you John for your well written, thoughtful response. I do agree that change is inevitable and that revitalization in Fannin County is both needed and desired.

I went to London last year and was mildly disturbed by the frequent encounters one has with Starbucks. If you have been there recently, you know that I am not exagerating; there is a Starbucks approximately every two blocks. That surely was not something I had anticipated. Where were the pubs?

Having arrived rather late in the evening, my boyfriend and I were obliged to eat dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe, as it was the only restaurant open within walking distrance from our hotel. My first night in London and I couldn't tell if I was in New York City, London, or Atlanta; the place was exactly the same.

I counter the premise that changing the alcohol law will bring "better" restaurants into the county. Ruby Tuesdays, Applebees, Longhorn Steakhouse, Hooters, Outback Steakhouse, and Red Lobster are really not that much better than fast food restaurants, they are just higher up on the food chain. Just like the Hard Rock Cafe, if you have been to one, you have been to them all. Do the majority of people who want alcohol really believe that having those types of restaurants represents progress, improvement, and quality?

What this type of progress constitutes is homogeneity...the same chain restaurants up and down the highways from Canton to Ellijay, Savannah to Miami, Chicago to Seattle, and Phoenix to LA.

I have been fortunate to be a "tourist" in many different locations across the country and around the world. I, and I believe most travelers who are away from home, seek out experiences and opportunities that are different and divergent from the familiar. Isn't it the distinct and unusual that make traveling exciting and extraordinary?

Caution for changing the alcohol law is not selfish but rather forward thinking. As a community, there still remains an opportunity to keep Blue Ridge unconventional, special, and unique for all the residents and tourists. My vision is unobstructed. What we both will see is that once those mediocre chain establishments are operating here, Blue Ridge and Fannin County will be devoid of distinction and relegated to ordinary and undistinguishable from every other place.