Split council OKs controversial beer garden plan

The Friends of Port Washington Parks and Recreation will run the city’s 15 beer gardens this summer, the Common Council agreed Tuesday night.

Aldermen voted 5-1 to approve a controversial plan to have the Friends group run the Saturday beer gardens with input from the civic organizations that have historically hosted the events.

Ald. Pat Tearney cast the dissenting vote and Ald. Paul Neumyer was absent.

Tearney said he is concerned that the organizations that have built up the beer garden series over the past eight years may be alienated by the changes.

“My big concern is these organizations that have worked very hard to make this successful are feeling slighted,” he said.

Aldermen stressed that the program will be reviewed at the end of the season, and changes could be made then.

The plan approved by the city has the Friends group organizing each of the beer garden events in coordination with a civic organization.

The Friends will be responsible for everything from pulling permits and obtaining insurance to ordering food and beverages and hiring entertainment. The civic groups, which would provide volunteers for the event, would have input into the food, beverage and entertainment options.

The civic groups would be given tips left at the beer garden but not the profit from the individual event. Instead, the profits from each beer garden would be pooled with the civic organizations splitting the total with the Friends group.

Much of the council’s discussion centered around the cost-sharing plan as well as concerns that the changes may take away from the individuality of each event.

Ald. Dan Benning suggested that the profit-sharing plan be tiered, with groups that run successful events that bring in a significant amount of money be given a larger share of the profits.

A similar idea was suggested by Ald. John Sigwart, while Tearney said that civic organizations that provide plenty of volunteers be given more control of those events and a larger share of the profits. Justin Myers, president of the Friends group, told aldermen that the group is willing to discuss the profit-sharing, but noted that roughly 40% of the profits of successful beer gardens have gone to cover the expenses that the Friends will now be covering.  

He added that the Friends group is willing to look at the cost-sharing amounts. 

But City Attorney Eric Eberhardt said the council’s role was not to determine “how the profit pie is sliced.” Instead, he said, aldermen were voting on the concept on how to run the beer gardens.

A number of the civic groups have opposed the profit-sharing concept, saying it takes away the incentive to work harder to drum up business.

“The profit sharing is still a problem I won’t be able to get past our membership,” Thom Evans of the Stars and Stripes Legacy Club said.

Recreation Director Kiley Schulte said the change in the beer garden program is needed to make the event sustainable and fair to organizations, many of which want to host these events but are locked out because the same groups sign up each year.

The option adopted by the council would retain the current list of hosting organizations for this year, but that could change in future years.

Dave Mueller, who represented both the Port Washington Lions Club and the Port Food Pantry, suggested that the clubs that helped establish the beer gardens, such as the Lions, Kiwanis, Rotary and Be3, be ensured a date each year, especially since many of these groups have made improvements to the grounds of the beer garden. 

She presented three options to the council for consideration. In addition to the option approved by aldermen, one would have ended the beer garden series and instead had each group apply for a date and handle all the arrangements on their own. The third would have continued the existing beer garden structure with increased fees to cover the city’s expenses.

The civic groups were polled about these options, Schulte said, and seven supported the option ultimately approved by the council, two supported having individual events and three supported the existing structure.

Several aldermen asked if there was a hybrid structure that might be more palatable to both the civic groups and the Parks and Recreation Department, perhaps one that incorporated a different cost sharing option.

“We can definitely go back to the drawing table,” Schulte said. But, she warned that would mean no beer gardens this year because of the time needed to plan for the earliest events.

Several other changes to the beer gardens were also proposed. Ald. Dan Benning suggested they run from June through September, noting that holding these events in October is dicey because of the changing weather.

But Schulte said, the beer garden area is frequently reserved by the public during June for events such as graduation parties and weddings.