Leafy Latitude gets their liquor license

It took more than a year, but the owners of the Leafy Latitude cigar bar on Nevada Way finally got their liquor license approved last week.

Back in September of 2023, the business —housed in the long-vacant building that once was home to a branch of Nevada State Bank —was still in “coming soon” status and tried to get a license to sell booze along with the cigars and, possibly, hookah. The meeting with the Business License Liquor Board did not go well.

Citing a lack of data, City Attorney Brittany Walker (the board consists of the city manager, city attorney and city clerk) flat-out said that she thought the business was planning to be a liquor bar masquerading as a tobacco retailer.

“I also have significant concerns in general that this applicant could ever meet our business license and liquor licensing code,” Walker said at that time. “Because they are applying for the cocktail lounge liquor license, which requires that there be a principal business other than the sale of alcohol. With the sale of alcohol only, there is only one license category that applies, which is our tavern license and we are limited to three in the entire city based on our population under our code. We are limited to three tavern licenses. I do have concerns that this business, in effect, would be operating as a tavern rather than a cigar and tobacco retailer. So for all of those reasons, I will be voting to deny this application.”

When the owners of the business appealed to the city council, only now-former councilman Matt Fox sided with them.

“I think we should approve it,” he said. “Let them try. If it doesn’t work, it doesn’t work. But I don’t think we should be the ones to say ‘no’.”

Fox was, it turns out, the only council member who had ever been to a cigar lounge.

Brady Prestwich, utility billing and collection supervisor whose job also includes dealing with business licenses, noted that the owners had provided six months’ worth of sales data and a solid estimate of what they expected the ratio to be of tobacco sales versus alcohol sales. But he also made it clear that staff was making no recommendation.

“Staff respectively defer back to license board to consider approval or denial of the Class B cocktail license for Leafy Latitude,” he told the board.

Walker was the first to speak, referencing the fact that, at the time of the original application, there was no backing documentation for the applicants’ projections of alcohol versus tobacco sales.

“I felt at the time, as a board member, the information provided was not adequate to fully evaluate that the sale of tobacco would be the principal business at this establishment. In that time since that denial, the business has opened and has provided the board with data showing their sales of tobacco which is extremely helpful to understand that there is a principal business there for cigars and and hookah in the future,” she said.

“So, I really appreciate the efforts of the applicant to provide this additional information and providing us with that financial analysis to show how the sale of tobacco is the principal business here. So, again, I just want to thank the applicant for working with the city and working with the board and providing this additional information for us and I do feel comfortable approving the Class B cocktail lounge liquor license for Leafy Latitude today.”

This time, the vote of the board was unanimous to approve the permit.