Well folks, we've held off in updating our blog for the past couple weeks, hoping to write something with an ending paragraph along the lines of "so we should have our tap license in our inbox within the next 72 hours." Unfortunately, that is not the case.
Last Friday, during what has become our routine of calling PLCB, we were informed one petition against us was withdrawn and was being "entered into the system" as we spoke. We were also informed that because that one petition mentioned the word "church" we would still be going to a hearing on the one church within the 300ft radius of us, in addition to the remaining petition unless it was also withdrawn.
The church folks, who seem to be good and level headed folks, had already talked to our PLCB investigator face to face and given a statement that they were not opposing our license. Since this still appeared to be an issue on the PLCB end, they quickly gave yet another one. "Church" seems to no longer be an issue. Why create a state level fight between two amicable neighbors??
Unfortunately (we realize how many times that word has been used in this post), we still have one remaining petition against us. Nobody seems to have a connection to the one remaining petitioner to talk him down off the ledge, other than of course the one petitioner who already withdrew. In today's not so happy phone call, this time with Senator Brubaker's office, it was confirmed there is no withdrawal on record for the remaining petition.
Our case has yet to even be sent to the "legal department" to be assigned a hearing date. It appears that original timeline of four months will be true. Financially, things do not look good for us hanging on to our little brewery for that length of time. We have been told that everything else for our license is in place, and if there were to be a withdrawal, we would swiftly be in receipt of our license.
We hate to end posts on a downer note, so on the positive note ... we're reminded daily of what an incredible community we live in. Had none of this happened, we likely would have never met so many wonderful people. The brewery, during its extremely limited hours open, has been packed with not only beer drinkers but also those who have said they don't really drink beer but heard of our plight and wanted to come in to support us. There are moments in the brewery talking to these kind people that its hard to fight back the tears. We know that had this happened to us in many other communities, the outpouring of support might not have been as generous. Thank you, Mount Joy. This is why we chose here for our little brewery, and our home.
We're not giving up hope, although it is getting much harder to hang onto as the weeks pass by. We'll keep pressing on every day, for as long as we can hold on. We're good people, supported by good people.
Keep on Zuckin' .....
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