DEDC seeks alcohol for concert series

This year’s installment of an annual summer concert series in Chapel Hill could be remarkably different from years past.

The Downtown Economic Development Corporation plans to petition the Chapel Hill Town Council in the next few weeks to change town ordinances so alcohol can be sold at the events.

A proposal presented to the corporation Wednesday by mayoral assistant Emily Dickens also addresses a concern on which the corporation is eager to pounce: holding the series downtown.

“We have businesses on Franklin Street and Rosemary Street that are not benefiting from events on McCorkle Place,” Dickens said.

McCorkle Place has played host to the series — which includes about six concerts, one each week — for the last few years. This year’s series will kick off about June 23, finishing in August.

Moving the events downtown and allowing alcohol sales at some or all of the concerts would market the events to a more desirable target audience, Dickens said.

“We need to shift our focus to people with expendable income,” she said. “…The town is trying to promote more diversity initiatives.”

Roger Perry, member of the corporation and the UNC Board of Trustees, put the value of alcohol sales more simply: “Lord knows this is a drinking town.”

Under Dickens’ proposal, the series would change to better accommodate professionals and students downtown, a sharp contrast to the family-oriented concerts held before by the Downtown Commission, a local merchants’ group whose funding now goes to the corporation.

Dickens estimated downtown events could draw several hundred more concertgoers than McCorkle Place could hold — or attract.

Perry said he supports the idea of reaching new target audiences and suggested that planners try to cover more than one.

“If we’re talking about six events, they don’t need to be tailored to the same audiences,” he said. “It’s important to target groups we haven’t targeted before.”

Dickens told the corporation to focus on hiring bands already well-known in the community, such as Doug Clark and the Hot Nuts.

Alcohol vendors already have shown interest in the change; representatives from a Durham Budweiser distributor and the locally owned Top of the Hill Restaurant and Brewery both have asked to be involved.

Pat Evans, one of two Downtown Commission members present at the meeting, said she agreed with Dickens’ recommendation to actively pursue local vendors.

But Downtown Commission Chairwoman Mary Jo Stone warned the corporation to use caution in handling the series. “I see it turning into another Apple Chill,” she said.

Corporation members voted at the meeting to create a community advisory committee to guide the series’s planning.

Corporation member Tom Tucker will join representatives from the commission, West Franklin Street restaurant association, Chapel Hill-Orange County Visitor’s Bureau and other groups to plan the series.

The corporation next will meet April 13.

Contact the City Editor at citydesk@unc.edu.