We’re on the cusp of publishing ABC: 1,2,3, our comprehensive guide to North Carolina’s best (and worst) liquor stores. Our rating of stores across the control state debuts on Monday, but the list is reserved for paying subscribers and liquor store package buyers. Don’t miss it!
The hardest part of rating the top-selling Alcoholic Beverage Control store in each of contiguous North Carolina’s 97 wet counties wasn’t covering thousands of miles of highway to reach them or even deciding how to score a “Made in North Carolina” section that consists exclusively of Old Smoky Tennessee Moonshine jars.
By far, the most challenging component of this project was identifying the top-selling stores.
There are few types of information more central to open records law than financial reports, so I didn’t anticipate any trouble on this front when we decided to limit our survey to one store per county. But flaws in the ABC system—including decentralized leadership, a culture of secrecy, and inadequate legal training for board members and store managers—meant it took more than one month to extract revenue information from North Carolina’s 171 local ABC boards.
(That includes the ABC Board of Rutherfordton, which was initially befuddled by how to respond to my public records request. An interim general manager called after receiving it to say she wasn’t sure how to calculate revenue because a former store manager had stolen $374,807.10 to play the slots at Two Kings Casino.)
To be sure, people seeking public records from the federal government have it worse, sometimes waiting years for documents, data, and emails. But Pate McMichael, director of the North Carolina Open Government Coalition at Elon University, warns that if public officials aren’t constantly reminded of their obligation to comply with open records laws, the North Carolina statute guaranteeing access to materials made or received by state agencies could become equally worthless.
“What will save our public records access is using the law,” Pate said. “Being curious waters the public records law and keeps it an important part of our democracy.”
While anyone can file a public records request, it’s long been a favorite tool of journalists. Yet the number of journalists nationwide has plummeted by 75 percent since 2000. Nowadays, ABC boards—which are collectively responsible for more than $1.8 billion in sales revenue—field so few public records requests that several board members told me they weren’t familiar with the provision or didn’t believe it applied to them.
“Public officials should embrace these laws because it gives them protection,” Pate continued. “You communicate everything is being conducted in a way that should be public.”
From my interactions with board members, I got the sense that many of them took a different view.
“It’s a little hard to believe that they don’t have a database,” Pate said when I explained I had to file 171 individual public records requests at the start of this project.
Indeed, the state ABC Commission collects sales reports from boards. But those reports are consolidated, so it’s impossible to discern from them which store in a board’s jurisdiction is responsible for the highest percentage of overall revenue. “The local ABC boards would be the best point of contact to find this information,” an ABC spokesperson instructed me via email on June 23.
Additionally, many counties have multiple boards—Brunswick County alone has nine boards operating 11 stores—so the information submitted to the state doesn’t match up with a map in the way I required.
Accordingly, I sent the following email to each board on June 24:
Nearly half of the boards responded as required by law, which meant dozens of requests were still outstanding. I sent a reminder on July 10:
Starting the following week, I took a tougher tone:
And learned later that the ABC Commission chair underscored my request:
Still, dozens of boards failed to comply (as the wording here suggests, lots of store managers called me with specific excuses.)
By the end of the month, we were down to 13 holdouts.
The Mocksville-Cooleemee ABC board was the very last board to disclose its top-selling store, supplying the asked-for information on August 1.
So, what kept these boards from providing such basic information? Lots of things.
I’m having personal issues.
I’m having personnel issues.
It went to spam.
We only have one store.
I don’t believe individuals should be allowed to request information.
Why do you need it?
“In the state of North Carolina, you don’t have to identify yourself and you don’t have to explain why you want the information,” Pate confirmed. “It really puts the onus on the public body to disclose.”
While lots of ABC boards apparently don’t feel the weight of that onus, it’s important to acknowledge that a number of boards fulfilled the request without complaint. First among them was Dare County, which responded within eight minutes.
Although Dare County’s store finished in the middle of the pack, the Dare County ABC board deserves special recognition for respecting the sunshine laws that keep our democracy functional. Good on you, Dare. As for the rest of the rankings, we’ll start sharing them on Monday. If you’re not a paying subscriber, make sure you don’t miss out!
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