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Keith B wrote:

92f-fan wrote:

Keith B wrote: I see one flaw in your program; 51% sign or not, it is still illegal to carry in a 51% establishment. The only think the absence of a red sign provides is a DEFENSE to prosecution only. You can still be arrested.

if you cant count on the legally required signs how are you expected to know what % of the revenue comes from what ?

Just never carry anywhere alcohol MIGHT be served whether you can see it or not ?

You can usually tell pretty easily. If the people predominately go into a place to drink and not eat, then best to err on the side of caution and not carry there until you can validate it by looking at their license on the wall.

You can also sometimes determine if they are NOT a 51% establishment ahead of time by going to the TABC website and searching fore their license. If the website shows FB in the on the subordinates line, they have a 'Food and Beverage' license and are NOT a 51% establishment.

That all depends on where you are. In Austin, that line is not so distinct. There are many "all ages" music venues that make quite a bit of money off of ticket sales (Zona Rosa, Stubb's, Emo's, etc), and certainly aren't making money from selling alcohol to all the minors who go to the shows. But they have a TABC license without a FB suboordinate, so we have no way of telling short of going up and requesting the TABC license. And good luck finding that license with several hundred people milling around; I've never been able to spot it at any of those venues.

I believe I called TABC compliance about Zona Rosa at one point a couple years ago, as they had absolutely no signs at all. TABC couldn't give me any kind of answer if the place was 51%, but told me they'd get someone on them about putting up signs. I haven't been back since then to check.

dihappy wrote:

Keith B wrote:What you more than likely saw was this sign:



This sign is required at any location that sells alcohol for on or off-premise consumption and makes less that 51% of its revenue from the alcohol sales. It is OK to carry past as long as they don't have a 30.06 sign posted also.

Hey Keith, or anyone,

Do you know if that sign is actually "REQUIRED" for businessess who choose NOT to post a 30.06?

Edit: I think i found the answer on TABC website, and i think the sign is a requirement.

Yes, any TABC-licensed establishment has to post one of the two signs. 51% establishments are required to post the red 51% sign. Everyone else who sells under a TABC license has to post the sign above. Now, whether this happens in reality is another story. There are also the confused merchants (mainly restaurants in my experience) who improperly post 51% signs even though they are obviously not 51% locations. The stickler in the law is that it depends on if they are actually 51% locations as determined by TABC, not what signs they post.

We also have the recently-enacted law that provides a defense to prosecution for carrying in a 51% location that does not post signs on all entrances to clearly identify it as a 51% location. While far from a resolution to the haziness of proper notification, it's certainly a small step in the right direction.