Voters allow bars, restaurants to freely sell alcohol in the Heights

Originally published on Nov. 8, 2017, on Chron.com at https://tinyurl.com/y6bbu5hm.

By Roy Kent
Staff writer

You will no longer have to be a member of some nonprofit or association to drink a beer at a Heights-area bar.

Following Tuesday night’s election, Heights voters passed the city of Houston’s Proposition F with a 60.6 percent to 39.4 percent margin. More than 2,400 voters cast ballots in the election open only to Heights residents. Turnout was about 22 percent, according to the Harris County Clerk’s Office.

Prior to Tuesday night, residents of the Heights had been unable to get a drink in a bar without restrictions since 1912, the year the ban went into effect. When Houston annexed the neighborhood in 1918, the ban remained in place.

Agricole Hospitality led the charge in getting the century-old prohibition repealed. The company maintains numerous restaurants in the Heights area, including Revival Market, Coltivare and Eight Row Flint. It has plans to open Indianola, Vinny’s and Miss Carousel in 2018.

“Voters who support this measure are casting a vote in favor of small businesses like ours,” Agricole’s Morgan Weber said in a blog post.

The Heights is bordered by Loop 610 on the north, Oxford Street on the east, Interstate 10 to the south and North Durham Drive to the west.

While it was possible to get a drink in a Heights bar previously, the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission ruled that restaurants and bars which sold alcohol in the dry parts of the Heights had to establish separate nonprofits or associations. Proceeds of alcohol sales then paid for the private club’s operation.

Last year, residents in the Heights overturned a 1904 rule which prohibited the sale of alcohol for off-premises consumption. The overturning of the rule allowed neighborhood grocery stores to begin sales in the area. Nearly 64 percent of voters cast ballots to rescind the prohibition with a voter turnout of more than 78 percent, according to figures from the Harris County Clerk’s Office.

Texas-based grocer, H-E-B put more than $60,000 behind the Houston Heights Beverage Coalition, a political action group sponsoring the efforts to pass the reversal.

Coltivare bartender William Stewart makes three orders of gin and tonic, the most popular drink at the restaurant, at the bar on Friday, June 9, 2017, in Houston.
Yi-Chin Lee/Staff photographer