NJ town getting first liquor store in 100 years

First of all, I was today years old when I learned just how many New Jersey towns are dry towns. At the end of this brief story you’ll find a gallery that shows all the New Jersey towns where you couldn’t legally buy a drink as of last year.

There are dozens, and I’m floored. I lived for a little over a year in Ocean City and I recall how everyone, locals and tourists alike, had to drive over the 9th Street bridge (Stainton Memorial Causeway) to a liquor store just on the other side. It must have been a goldmine. I honestly thought that was the only dry town in the state.

How wrong I was.

A town in Burlington County is getting its first liquor store in over 100 years. Moorestown was legally decreed a dry town bank in 1922 when it was incorporated.  Their mayor says there were some places long ago to get alcohol but that was before it was officially a town.

We know there were taverns that sold alcohol in the 1700s and 1800s, but to the best of my knowledge this is the first legal liquor store since Moorestown was incorporated as a township,” Mayor Nicole Gillespie told nj.com.

The store is Super Buy Rite and is opening this spring in Moorestown Mall. And it was quite some time in coming.

Voters approved a referendum ending the ban on alcohol sales back in 2011. The town council however didn’t pass an ordinance authorizing liquor sales until a decade later in 2021. Moorestown sold a few consumption licenses to restaurants since that time but this is the first distribution license granted.

So how many towns in New Jersey remained dry as of last year? You may be surprised. Take a look.

Opinions expressed in the post above are those of New Jersey 101.5 talk show host Jeff Deminski only.

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