T-R PHOTO BY ROBERT MAHARRY On Monday night, the Marshalltown city council voted 5-2 to renew the liquor license for The Depot at 114 N. Center St. after Councilor Gary Thompson pulled the item from the consent agenda for further discussion.

The Marshalltown city council spent about 10 minutes discussing a liquor license renewal for an establishment located just down the road from city hall during Monday night’s meeting after it was pulled from the consent agenda for further consideration.

The renewal for The Depot, a liquor store located at 114 N. Center St., was pulled at the request of Councilor Gary Thompson.

“I’ve been telling people that the police visit this location every day, 365 days a year. I’m here to publicly apologize. I embellished that by 43 days. The police are there 322 days a year,” Thompson said. “So let’s say that the average stay of one police officer is a half an hour per call, and that’s not counting multiple officers being there. So if you take 322 times a half an hour, that’s 160 hours, divided by four 40 hour weeks. So you taxpayers are paying one officer to spend one month of his year at that location. And I’m asking you, is that the way you want to spend your money?”

In conclusion, he asked his fellow councilors to deny the permit and predicted the owners of the store would appeal to the state. Thompson said he would want city lawyers to fight it.

“I’ve gone on the record saying I believe in root cause problem solving. This is not the root cause, but sometimes you need to attack the symptoms too,” he said. “There’s a problem in that facility and the property area right there, so I pulled this to make my case and I will be voting no on this renewal.”

Fellow Councilor Mark Mitchell also indicated he would be voting no “on behalf of the late Al Hoop,” the longtime 4th Ward councilor who was known for opposing all liquor license applications. Councilor Jeff Schneider said he heard Thompson’s concerns but worried it would simply force the MPD to spend more time at other similar establishments, and he asked Police Chief Mike Tupper to weigh in on the matter.

Tupper said he was “shocked” the item was pulled from the consent agenda as he hadn’t heard about it ahead of time and shared his thoughts on why he didn’t see a compelling reason to deny the license.

“I think we have to understand what a call for service is, and we have to understand that convenience stores, by their very nature, being open for extended hours, attracting a lot of people, we’re gonna see calls for service to these types of locations,” he said. “If you look at Casey’s, if you look at Kwik Trip, you look at Hy-Vee, we go to Walmart multiple times a week. These places draw calls for service. So I don’t disagree with Councilperson Thompson that on occasion, there have been issues there, but if that establishment calls the police, that’s a call for service. They’re doing what we ask them to do. If they call us to report a crime or ask for help, that generates a call for service.”

Additionally, incidents that occur in the parking lot like traffic stops, parking complaints or accidents also generate calls for service. Tupper said he had no knowledge of any liquor law violations at The Depot or any efforts by the liquor license holder to obstruct investigations or not be cooperative with law enforcement.

“No doubt, we’ve had a lot of calls to that location. I could give you a laundry list of several others where we have a lot of calls. That doesn’t mean that they shouldn’t have a liquor license,” he said. “If you’re wanting my recommendation, my recommendation means nothing. It’s up to you, but as your police chief, I’m not recommending that you deny this application. I’m not aware of any reason that they should be denied.”

Mayor Joel Greer commented that in his 12 years of involvement with city government, he could only recall one instance in which Tupper had not recommended renewing a liquor license because the owner of two establishments had not been cooperative with investigations into “serious, life threatening assaults.”

“We take this very seriously. We’re not just rubber stamping. I do look at these, but the state has a very strict criteria of when you can deny and when you can’t,” Tupper said. “And I think we have to be careful about when we pull out that card. But again, it’s up to you. My professional opinion is I don’t see a reason to deny the liquor license.”

A vote to approve the license then passed by a 5-2 vote, with Thompson and Mitchell opposed. After the meeting, Tupper shared data about The Depot from July 1, 2023 to July 1, 2024 indicating that there were 175 calls for service during that time period, or over 14 per month.

Tupper described the majority of said calls as “petty crimes, minor issues, and officer initiated calls” and didn’t feel that it was anything he would describe as “dangerous or unusual” for an establishment open for extended hours seven days a week.

According to property records on the Marshall County Beacon website, The Depot is owned by GHH LLC of Cedar Falls, which also owns Marshall BWS on North 3rd Avenue, The Lounge on Main (formerly Marshall Tobacco and Vape Outlet) on West Main Street and East Side Liquor on East Nevada Street.

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Contact Robert Maharry at 641-753-6611 ext. 255 or

rmaharry@timesrepublican.com