Town Meeting voted last night to "level the playing field" among Westwood supermarkets by allowing three more beer and wine licenses in town, but it denied the opportunity for other operations to sell liquor.
Last spring, Town Meeting gave the approval for Wegmans grocery store to sell beer and wine at the future Westwood Station store pending the approval of the Legislature and the signature of the governor.
The bill, however, was initially held up by state Rep. Angelo Scaccia, D-Readville, acting on behalf of Rick Roche, owner of Roche Bros. supermarket, which has a store in town and will be a competitor of Wegmans.
After town officials decided to support adding three beer and wine permits, Scaccia dropped his hold.
"That compromise brings us here tonight," said Selectmen Patrick Ahearn, who urged it is vital to "level the playing field."
After Scaccia released his hold, however, state Rep. William Galvin, D-Canton, put a hold of his own on the beer and wine permit petition over concerns with the developer regarding traffic in his town.
"I don't like it when the wishes of Town Meeting are ignored by the legislature," said Ahearn, but assured the members that Westwood is respectful of Town Meeting's wishes.
He said he couldn't promise that Galvin, who he said was using the issue as a bargaining chip, or someone else wouldn't block the new bill to allow three more liquor licenses in town, but he would "work diligently with all the resources we have to try to push this through."
"Tonight we're here to decide what's in the best interest of Westwood," said Town Meeting member Dave Atkins, explaining Town Meeting can't control the actions of Canton or Roche. "They're just playing the game that is politics."
He added that his colleagues should decide if they simply want to have more beer and wine licenses for Westwood businesses to apply for and not worry about what brought them there or what is going on in the State House.
Several meeting members, however, said they were offended that Roche wielded so much power in the process.
Town Meeting member Marybeth Persons questioned Ahearn on why the wishes of the spring Town Meeting to only allow for the one license were not heard. She argued the special Town Meeting was called because of the wishes of one business and one person.
"I understand the resentment," said Roche, explaining that he asked Westwood Station developers to include more licenses on their article last year but was denied.
Echoing Ahearn, he said he was simply "asking for a level playing field."
"Tonight we can correct what most residents felt was an unfair process in beer and wine licensing," Roche said.
"I'm very troubled that we're here tonight," said Finance Committee Chairman Jim Connors.
He said it was the intention of the town to look into more licenses for the next annual Town Meeting in May, well before Wegmans would be open for business.
"I think we had ample time to remedy (the fairness) issue," he said.
Currently, the only three locations that fit under the specifications of the special Town Meeting article - grocery stores with more than 1,000 square feet of retail floor area - are Roche Bros., High Street Market and Lamberts.
Liz Adams, owner of High Street Market, said she would be very interested in pursuing a license.
Under state law, chain stores can only possess three licenses in the state. Roche told Town Meeting that if he was forced to, he would transfer a license from one of his three locations into Westwood, but in the meantime he would work to abolish or amend the law to allow for more licenses throughout the state.
The article passed a voice vote with a clear majority.
The second article on the special Town Meeting warrant was indefinitely postponed - it was not approved at last night's Town Meeting, but it can be brought up at future venues.
Very little discussion was held on the matter of allowing two stores of any size to apply to selectmen for full liquor licenses.
The Finance Committee had previously expressed concerns that approving article, as written, would not give the town enough control over the location, type and size of the business.
Westwood resident David Feyler, who sponsored the article, argued that the location would be logical - along a highway like Rte. 1 or Rte. 109, in the Roche Bros. area, or in Westwood Station. He said he was interested in pursuing one of the two licenses but recognized that both would be up for anyone to petition for.
Feyler also added that his store, if he obtained a permit, would be equipped with an ID scanner that detected fraudulent licenses, a device that he invented himself. Partly because of that, he assured the town his store would be safe.
Roche vouched for the effectiveness of the scanner and said he was in favor of the article, but it was to no avail.
The measure failed on a voice vote.
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