Liquor store plans canceled

Community members, district oppose proposed liquor store in Oak Park

A private proprietor recently canceled plans to open a liquor store on the corner of Lindero Canyon Road and Kanan Road due to concerns from Oak Park community members.

Some parents were concerned that a liquor store’s presence would be detrimental to the community and its youth, and many discussed the store on the social media app “Nextdoor.”

I feel that we should be more restrictive on the sale of alcohol,

— Tony Knight

The prospective store would have been near Stevenson Fitness, within walking distance from a Kanan Shuttle stop.

“We want to keep the neighborhood as safe as it is: a family community,” Oak Park parent Ruth Rose said. “We stopped the gas station in ’92 and the liquor store this year.”

While there are no liquor stores in Oak Park, there is a liquor store near the intersection of Kanan Road and Canwood Street in Agoura Hills.

“I don’t think we need a liquor store in this area as we already have businesses [near] Oak Park that sell alcohol,” Oak Park parent Michael Robbins said.

The prospective liquor storeowner also owns stores in Santa Barbara, which sell tobacco products, liquor and pornography. He declined to comment for this story.

Superintendent Tony Knight also brought up his concern with the Oak Park Unified School District board in March, according to documents posted on the district website.

Later, Knight explained his reasoning.

“I feel that we should be more restrictive on the sale of alcohol,” Knight wrote in an email. “It is responsible for so many deaths and health problems and costs our society so much in terms of medical costs, productivity, and most importantly, in tragedy after tragedy.”

On Nextdoor, pro-liquor store advocates wrote that “the liquor store could offer both tax revenue and addition to employment in Oak Park.”

Oak Park resident Brenna Gutell said she believes that any business to fill up some of the empty stores would be beneficial.

“Having empty stores at any of the local centers is not good for them or the community,” Gutell said.

However, some residents are especially cautious after a man died in a single-car drunk driving accident on Lindero Canyon Road in 2015.

Other community members, however, believe that concerns about the liquor store were mostly overblown.

“If you’re going to pick an issue that will improve our community, worrying about a liquor store being opened should not be the priority,” Ernest Lawrence Middle School teacher and Oak Park parent John DeLuca said.