The Adams Morgan Advisory Neighborhood Com-mission voted at its Dec. 3 meeting in favor of supporting a resolution brought before it by the Kalorama Citizens Association seeking to apply for a moratorium from the D.C. Alcohol Beverage Control board. This was the second time in three months the issue has come before the commission.

Tempers flared when the proposal came to the floor and some present cried foul at the tactics used to introduce the measure. Commissioner James Coleman and Madam’s Organ owner Bill Duggan called the move a "back door" way of approving a measure that had already failed.

ANC Chairman Todd Mosley said the distinction here was the ANC rejected the first proposal that would have bound the commission to do the application work, whereas the latest vote only supports the citizens association in its efforts.

A similar proposal failed to garner enough votes to pass at the ANC’s Oct. 7 town hall meeting devoted exclusively to the subject. That proposal, introduced by Mosley, called for the ANC to apply for a three-year moratorium on all liquor licenses in the busiest restaurant district in the city.

The Kalorama Citizens Association proposal, which was passed at that association’s Nov. 19 meeting, is stricter than the previous proposal and calls for a five-year moratorium as well as a ban on transfers of existing licenses.

Coleman also objected that the commission was voting on the issue at the ANC’s last meeting of the year, with a newly elected commission due to take over in January, and that no advance notice was given on the issue. The issue was the seventh item listed on the night’s agenda and phrased only as, "Request for Support; Kalorama Citizens Association."

Copyright 1998, The Common Denominator