Health Department's revenue enhancement + Develop New Albany's event calendar = ?

Tonight is Develop New Albany's annual fundraising event, Exclusively New Albany.

NABC will play no role in this event, but in spite of what you might think, this isn't so much of an issue with me, even if I enjoy tweaking and tweeting about it.

DNA's apparent policy (albeit one that varies by the hour and source) is that there can be no cash vending without organizational membership, and that's fine by me. Briefly, it looked as though we might slip through with a technicality, by teaming with a DNA member business, but then our friend was told that he, too, couldn't vend.

Presumably there'll still be (non-local) alcoholic beverages on hand tonight. If it hasn't already been relayed, someone might wish to warn the vendor (?) of the Health Department's new temporary food permit expectation. This current reality is unjustified, and we'll eventually prevail in overturning it, but in the interim, it adds $20 for charitable purposes (i.e., a poor starving bureaucracy's coffers) each time a vendor pours publicly, even if the requisite ATC permit already is in hand.

In turn, perhaps Develop New Albany hasn't yet done the math, so I'll offer this: When it operates the annual Jingle Walk wine tasting this fall on Thanksgiving weekend, all the participating wineries now will be subject to the new permit procedure: $20 each, on top of what they're already donating, for what amounts to a bureaucratic usurpation.

As such, perhaps DNA is interested in joining the chorus against revenue enhancement protection rackets. The bar and restaurant sector could use DNA's support on this one. Ask yourselves: If this one gets past us, what's next?

However, in the short term: Help your vendor(s) avoid costs for requirements that absolutely no one at the Health Department told them about, and let your vendors know.