Community leaders in West Savannah banded together in 2018 to create a restriction on new alcohol licenses within an area of the neighborhood. Leaders active at the time say there was a prevalence of package stores that contributed to loitering, public drunkenness and blight.
Savannah City Council passed the West Savannah alcohol overlay district that year, solidifying a prohibition on new licenses within its boundaries. The overlay loosely extends from West Lathrop Avenue, including portions both north and south of Bay Street, to just beyond East Lathrop Avenue to the railroad tracks.
Two advocates for the overlay at the time–then alderman and current Mayor Van Johnson, and then neighborhood advocate and current Alderwoman Bernetta Lanier– both say the overlay has been effective. Those issues with loitering and blight have subsided, they said…