State to consider Red Barn liquor license transfers
A patron buys alcohol at the “walk up” store of the Old Red Barn in Sanders. (Navajo Times File Photo - Donovan Quintero)
WINDOW ROCK
A patron buys alcohol at the “walk up” store of the Old Red Barn in Sanders. (Navajo Times File Photo – Donovan Quintero)
While the Arizona Liquor Board considers granting the transfer of two liquor licenses from one criminal to a close friend, they will also feel the presence of over 100 concerned citizens riding four hours in transit buses to their Phoenix hearing to protest.
Concerned community members from Sanders, Ariz., and surrounding Navajo communities are riding buses today down to witness how the board will rule in two hearings scheduled between Gary McDonald, owner of Ole Red Barn and Lee’s Liquors, to George Ryan, also owner of Lee’s Liquors and 9+2 Enterprises, LLC.
Ryan is set to acquire the full ownership of both Ole Red Barn and Lee’s Liquors from McDonald. The hearing for both licenses is scheduled for 1 p.m. at the Arizona Department of Liquor Licenses and Control’s Industrial Commission Auditorium.
In addition to these concerned citizens, members of the Hope for Renewal Taskforce, the Nahata Dzil Commission Governance, Apache County, Navajo Nation Human Rights Commission, Arizona State Sen. Carlyle Begaye, Council delegate Lorenzo Curley and President Ben Shelly will join them in urging the liquor board not to grant the liquor transfer.
“We’re banning together to combat this issue,” said Ina Noggle, a member of the Hope for Renewal Taskforce, which formed last winter in response to McDonald’s application for liquor license renewal of Ole Red Barn and Lee’s Liquors.
Today in Phoenix, the liquor board will decide whether it will grant or deny the transfer of liquor licenses from McDonald, who recently reached a plea deal with Apache County for alleged drug charges that put him in jail.
McDonald’s sentencing for those charges is scheduled for Jan. 13, before Judge Gloria Kindig in the Navajo County Superior Court.
But, before the actions of the board occurs, the legal counsels for both Apache County and the Navajo Nation filed motions asking the board to appoint an administrative judge to hear the liquor license transfer in the form of a case.=
Highway 264,
I-40, WB @ Winslow