CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- The Mecklenburg County Alcoholic Beverage Control Board is supposed to police the liquor business. But last week it was representatives of that very liquor industry who were wining and dining the ABC Board's Chairman and a dozen or so top local officials and their spouses.
And as a result of the NewsChannel 36 I-Team raising questions about the holiday dinner party, the North Carolina ABC Commission has launched an investigation.
It started last Wednesday with a dinner for about 28 ABC officials and spouses at one of the best steak houses in Charlotte - Del Frisco's in South Park. Great steaks -- not cheap. But then again, the employees of the Mecklenburg County ABC Board didn't have to pay. The diners in the private room at the base of the restaurant's escalator included some of the top ABC board employees charged with controlling the sale of alcohol.
So who paid the tab? According to the Board's Community Relations Manager, Mary Ward, the Board officials were guests of a leading liquor supplier - Diageo. Diageo may not be a name familiar to many drinkers, but the brands the company distributes are familiar: Smirnoff, Cuervo, and Captain Morgan, among others.
The guests at the steak dinner included Mecklenburg ABC Board's CEO Calvin McDougal and ABC Board Chairman Parks Helms.
"The integrity of our government is compromised when people take gifts from people doing business with it," says Jane Pinsky of the North Carolina Coalition for Lobbying and Government Reform. "The whole ABC system seems to have some real problems."
It may be a real problem. But it's not real new.
Six years ago the NewsChannel 36 I-Team exposed the Mecklenburg ABC Board's junket to Palm Springs California, spending thousands of public dollars getting to a desert resort. The days spent at a world class resort were all in the name of an educational conference for regulators from states and municipalities that control the sale of liquor. CEO McDougal defended the trip saying, "Part of my job is to stay educated."
But by night in the Palm Springs desert the I-Team found public servants charged with controlling the liquor industry were instead its invited guests. It's similar to the entertainment provided last Wednesday night at the South Park steak house.
"For some people it's business as usual but it's not the way business should be done," said Ms. Pinsky.
No sooner than the I-Team raised the question with the ABC Commission in Raleigh, the Commission dispatched Alcohol Law Enforcement agents to investigate. Commission spokeswoman Agnes Stevens e-mailed a statement saying, "It is critical that the taxpayers have faith in government at all levels."
The chief administrative office at the state ABC commission, Mike Herring, referred the I-Team to a state law banning gifts from the liquor industry to retailers.
But in a telephone interview, Board Chairman Parks Helms said he doesn't think the law applies to local ABC boards, saying, "I have read this statute numerous times and I disagree. I do not agree that it applies to the dinner we had... I've got the statute. And I'm a lawyer."
Helms said neither he nor anyone else at the local ABC board does business directly with Diageo, the liquor supplier, instead ordering liquor through the state.
Neither the ABC commissioners nor Helms nor McDougal would speak on camera citing the pending investigation.
The written statement from the ABC Commission, sent by Ms. Stevens, says the Commission has the power to remove board members or employees it finds in violation of state law.
But Helms says he questions that authority over local boards.
The Alcohol Law Enforcement agents will report their findings to the ABC Commission in Raleigh.
