Dry Towns Could Soon Be Banned In New York State

A new law currently being passed through the New York State legislature could eliminate dry towns across the Empire State. 

Although dry counties in New York are prohibited, a law passed in 1934 post-prohibition allows individual cities, towns and villages to choose to ban the sale of alcohol. There admittingly aren’t many of them, compared to other states (comparatively, Pennsylvania has over 650 areas that have some sort of alcohol ban), however they do exist.

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Currently, there are several partially “dry towns” across New York, meaning they only allow or disallow alcohol sales during certain events or locations, and seven towns are dry altogether. They are:

• Caneadea in Allegany County
• Clymer in Chautauqua County
• Lapeer in Cortland County
• Orwell in Oswego County
• Fremont in Steuben County
• Jasper in Steuben County
• Berkshire in Tioga County

However, this new proposed law is hoping to change that. 

New Bill To Ban Dry Towns In New York State

The bill, currently on the floor of the state assembly, looks to end the option of towns and cities to eliminate the sale of alcohol, potentially increasing the profit of several local businesses and benefitting the town’s residents who buy their booze somewhere else. 

However, not everyone agrees with the potential ban– especially those concerned about alcohol abuse. The town supervisor of Caneadea, Philip Stockin, told the Associated Press, 

““It gets frustrating when the state hands down mandates, it takes more and more control away from the locals.”

What do you think?