The Naperville Liquor Commission met on Thursday, July 9, 2026, at 3:03 PM in Council Chambers. Mayor Wehrli called the meeting to order and recognized Commissioner Signorella's last meeting with a certificate of appreciation. The commission addressed several significant items: a request to increase the downtown late night permit cap, a detailed presentation and discussion on kratom and synthetic 7-OH products leading to a recommendation for a local sales ban, routine reports, and a decision to schedule a future discussion on happy hour restrictions. The meeting adjourned at 4:36 PM.
Good afternoon and welcome to the July 9th, 2026 Liquor Commission meeting. Roll call. Here. Here. Before we move into public forum, I want to start by acknowledging the departure of one of our commissioners. This is his last meeting tonight. Well, at least three honorably. Are there any speakers registered? We have one speaker signed up to speak today. Hello. We can hear you. Go ahead. Could you just state your name for the record and uh who you represent? Yeah, my name's Kevin Ray, vice president of Operations for uh Biagis and Ancho and Agave. Uh we have two restaurants on Route 59 and uh currently let's see 14 restaurants uh Biagis around the country and uh seven Anchos around the country but we have one of each in Naperville because we love Naperville. Um I want to thank the mayor and the commissioners for giving us this time to to chat about something and um when we were inquiring about opening our Ancho Nagave concept uh we're uh surprised to learn that happy hour is something that's not prohibited in Naperville. Um we utilize a happy hour in all of our other units, 21 of them across the uh the country. Um and so for a little bit of history for anybody that doesn't know many many years ago Ellinois prohibited happy hour statewide and did that for a couple of decades in 2001 they rolled that law back um and every municipality except Naperville um adhered to their decision to roll that back with certain restrictions and guidelines. Uh only let's see 15 hours a week total of discounted happy hour time is permissible. It's not permissible after 10 o'clock at night only four hours a day. There are guardrails on uh on the statewide happy hour restrictions. Uh for us in Naperville it becomes a little bit um problematic because we're at a little bit of a disadvantage when we've got communities right next to us in Flamefield Oswego uh Aurora Wheaton Downer's Grove that all have um happy hours that are restricted as the state has has allowed for um and I I don't want to diminish for a second the community's respect for the public safety and and we take that responsibility very seriously as well. Um but things have changed over the the years the decades really technology's gotten better Ubers are ubiquitous um people understand what alcohol consumption does to them uh operators are better trained and our our employees are better trained um the technology in general and and by the way when the state outlawed the uh the happy hours originally the uh the legal limit was uh point one it's now point oh eight as everybody knows countrywide so things have changed over the decades and it's been ten years since the state has rolled back their restrictions on happy hours and I think this might be a good opportunity for Naperville to consider doing the same. Again, uh being responsible, protecting the public that's all of us as alcohol servers our number one priority but um I think we can do that safely and um I'd like to ask the commission to consider that or take up that discussion. Thank you Commissioner Sheriko thank you mayor uh yeah uh mayor and I were speaking about this you sent the letter in and by the way I think your um your comments were very well thought out and and your presentation was excellent especially just not reading enough of a script. Thank you. Uh um you know we we were we discussed about this a little bit and you know the with the workaround has been in Naperville that you know we we do have happy hours but you just can't do alcohol. So they do the food part you know the which we do appetizers and hors d'oeuvres and whatnot at that price and that seems to have been a a reasonable uh workaround um but uh your comments also are something that I think are worth a discussion as well from my viewpoint uh we probably do have to take another look at that to say hey does this still apply uh we did it for a reason uh back uh when we had done it and uh now I guess we need to have that discussion about does this still apply to today with today's uh you know different as you said technologies and and uh things that are that are have changed over the years that make it perhaps not as uh applicable as it once was so um I'd be willing to have that discussion at some point if it's if it's you know, sure I I I think um procedurally, you could offer that motion during new business to bring it back on a future liquor commission agenda, and that would be the way to do it. Mr. Mayor, go ahead may I yes like to make a motion to uh it would be under due business. Oh, so uh when we get the new business. Yep, no worries. All right, I don't see any other questions. Thank you. Uh if you want to stick around, um uh you can see how the new business is. Absolutely, yeah. Okay. We want to hear some other presentations as well. Thank you for your consideration. Very well, thank you. Any other public forum speakers? Seeing none, we'll move on to all business D1. We have a motion to accept the meeting minutes from the prior meeting. Commissioner Signorella? So moved. Is there a second? Aye. I'm sorry, I'm looking at my microphones and controls here, and uh nobody else is lit up here. So, commissioner. Oh, I'm sorry.