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Proposed Bill Could Allow For Sunday Liquor Sales

Jacob McCleland / Oklahoma Public Media Exchange

A bill that would allow counties to choose whether or not to permit Sunday sales of alcohol at retail liquor stores passed out of the state Senate on Tuesday.

Voters approved state question 792 last November, which will allow grocery and convenience stores to sell wine and full-strength beer every day of the week. But retail liquor stores are still required to be closed on Sunday. The state question’s provisions go into effect in October 2018.

Republican state senator Stephanie Bice of Oklahoma City says Senate Bill 211 could potentially level the playing field for counties that border states where Sunday sales are already permitted.

“We also have to consider the tax revenue that may be lost to border states because people are going across the state to buy liquor in those stores that are on open on Sundays. This would give them some parity with those border counties.”

Bice says the 18 Oklahoma counties that do not permit liquor-by-the-drink will also have a chance to go wet.

“By passing this legislation now, it gives them a year, more than a year, for them to run a question on whether or not they want to become a wet county, and whether or not they want to have Sunday sales in their county.”

Counties would need a vote of the people to allow Sunday sales. The county vote could be generated by county commissions, or if 15 percent of a county’s registered voters sign a petition to ask for the vote.

The bill now heads to the House.

Jacob McCleland was KGOU's News Director from 2015 to 2018.
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