Utah town appears headed toward keeping booze prohibition

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“I just feel bad for those who want a bottle of wine or a glass of wine with your meal,” said Sharon Guymon, a restaurant owner who pushed to allow beer and wine sales after years of customer complaints. “I don’t think a glass would hurt anybody.”

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Others argued prohibition is key to the city’s character and worried that allowing alcohol could lead to public drunkenness and other problems.

Utah has only about half a dozen dry communities, according to state alcohol regulators. Blanding’s vote to reconsider its ban on beer and wine follows similar debates in other dry communities across the country in recent years.

Blanding has been dry since the 1930s, according to city officials. Talk of repealing the prohibition has surfaced periodically but 2017 was the first time the issue made it onto the ballot.

The conservative community, a stopover for road trips between Denver, southern Utah’s national parks and the Grand Canyon, has been a hotspot in decades-old debates over who controls land in the West, including the Bears Ears National Monument.

Many locals opposed the monument, saying the U.S. government unnecessarily locked up too much land by declaring the area a protected monument, and the declaration itself will flood the area’s Native American ruins and remote landscapes with visitors.

Several opponents of alcohol sales said they hoped that keeping a prohibition in Blanding could prevent the town from becoming overrun with tourists like the red rock vacation destination of Moab an hour north.

Lyman said he thought voters rejected alcohol sales because they were worried about being inundated with tourism and that more local adults and teens would abuse alcohol.

Lyman, who voted against allowing alcohol sales, said he believed the initiative failed by a large enough margin that it will be years before residents reconsider the ban.

In the meantime, Blanding’s drinkers can buy beer at a convenience store 3 miles (5 kilometres) outside of town or wine, liquor and more at a state-run liquor store about 20 miles (32 kilometres) away.

Guymon said she’ll keep serving non-alcoholic beer on her steakhouse’s menu and may offer non-alcoholic wines.

“The Europeans are still going to be disappointed when they come here that they can’t get a glass of wine with their meal,” said Guymon, a teetotaller and member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints . “That’s mainly what I was pushing for.”

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Follow Price on Twitter at https://twitter.com/michellelprice .

Michelle L. Price, The Associated Press