Council OKs special use to allow tap room

Thanks to the Oxford Village Council, a new microbrewery that’s coming to town will have a dedicated space for thirsty patrons to savor some suds.

Last week, council voted 2-1 to grant special land use approval for One Drop Brewing Co. to operate a tasting room, or tap room, where folks can purchase and imbibe on-site the beers produced there.

Owned by Addison Township resident Ben Schnurle and Morganne Matheis, One Drop Brewing Co. is looking to operate a microbrewery inside a 3,600-square-foot building located at 130 Oakdell Dr., just east of M-24.

Councilman Dave Bailey cast the lone dissenting vote “because I don’t know what a tasting room is officially.”

“If there’s any place where it’s defined on paper, I’d like to know what a tasting room is and I’m not going to accept somebody’s (word). I want to see it on paper what a tasting room is,” he said.

One Drop Brewing Co. has applied to the Michigan Liquor Control Commission (MLCC) for a micro brewer license, which would entitle it to manufacture no more than 60,000 barrels (1.86 million gallons) annually.

This license would allow One Drop Brewing to “sell beer it manufactures . . . for on-premises consumption . . . without  any additional license,” according to the MLLC.

One Drop Brewing will utilize a three-and-a-half barrel brewing system capable of producing 108-gallon batches.

One barrel equals 31 gallons.

Village planning commissioners voted to approve the microbrewery’s site plan at their Oct. 30 special meeting.

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