Community Essay : ‘A Hand Holding a Gun Reached Out and Started Firing’ : Alcohol sales: After a narrow escape in front of the local liquor store, the author asks for restrictions.

It was 11:30 p.m. and we were driving back to Pasadena from my wife’s parents’, almost home. Our daughter was asleep in her car seat. We were almost even with the neighborhood liquor store when a large American car with patches and bad paint coming from the other direction swerved left into the turning median. Horribly, a hand holding a gun reached out the front window from the back seat and started firing at the liquor store. We were in between.

I slid down in my seat and accelerated. Janet slid down. I felt a blow hit the car like a fist and just kept driving as the sound of shots receded. Then it was over. Everyone was OK. Our daughter didn’t wake up. In our driveway we found a dent in the front door on my side. When the police came and photographed the car they said it was probably a ricochet, that the gun was probably lowered as we drove through. The perpetrators were long gone. Earlier there had been a conflict between the liquor store clerks and a group of drunken customers, they said.

After the L.A. riots, I heard a woman on TV say to the Webster police-response panel, “I’m glad they took a long time coming, for one reason. The liquor store around the corner from my house is gone, and it’s quiet.” I understood what she was saying. The liquor store in our neighborhood is an ongoing problem. The police helicopter is a regular presence. I have seen men fighting in the parking lot. There have been other shooting incidents. When the pay phone was finally taken out a few years ago that improved things slightly, but no matter what is done, no matter who owns the store, some basic conditions will never change. Who goes to a liquor store at 11:00 at night? Most probably someone who has not planned ahead, has been drinking already and has drunk everything in the house. To get to the liquor store they have probably driven a car. Why indulge someone in this condition?

I talked to my local councilman’s field representative, who lives nearby. She was sympathetic, but said that business owners have rights, and once a liquor store is allowed to remain open late it apparently has that right for good. What I fail to understand is why a liquor license was issued recently for a new mini-market across the street from the liquor store. The license has more conditions attached, shorter hours, but I think the sheer number of stores that sell alcohol in one neighborhood should be considered, too.

Some might argue that a liquor store merely reflects the neighborhood in which it is located. That is partly true, but the reflection is culled from the neighborhood’s worst moments. It draws people with problems, fuels those problems and gives them a place to focus and become public. San Marino recently debated for the umpteenth time whether to allow the sale of beer and wine in restaurants within its confines. It has a total of two liquor stores. San Marino is clear on this issue. They don’t want establishments that generate problems. There are alcoholics in San Marino, one can say with certainty, but it is one of the richest cities in the country and knows how to protect itself. My neighborhood does not.

I think it is time we take a different approach to liquor stores. I don’t care who owns them. Liquor licenses should be granted for a set period with no promise of renewal. With a greater threat to their licenses, liquor store owners would find ways to minimize the problems their stores cause. Our neighborhood liquor store has traded its pink and yellow painted storefront and windows choked with stand-up ad cutouts and electric beer signs for a brand new cinder block wall. The late-night employees may appreciate this, but it doesn’t help me when I’m driving by.