Carmel planning commission directs staff to reconcile AW Shucks's long-running drinking-place and restaurant permits

Chair Sheryl LePage opened the Planning Commission's Oct. 8 public hearing on a director's referral about AW Shucks, a long-standing Ocean Avenue business, after staff said decades of building permits and a recent business license appear to conflict with the original Use Permit.

Anna from Community Planning & Building told commissioners that records show a drinking-place Use Permit approved in the early 1990s with conditions that limited kitchen equipment, followed by building permits in the mid-1990s and 2008 that added cooking facilities. A business license issued in 2023 listed the operation as a full-line restaurant with an ancillary drinking place, creating a legal uncertainty staff said should be "cleaned up."

Property representative John Plastini and current owner-operator Karen Bassi described the site's long history as a drinking establishment and said past city approvals and building permits led them to believe the business could continue operating with an expanded food program. Bassi said food sales subsidize the operation and that forcing a rollback to a limited ancillary menu would threaten the business's viability and resale value.

Commissioners pressed staff and the owners on the code criteria that distinguish a drinking place from a full-line restaurant, including the commonly cited seat-count threshold that bars may not exceed about 20% of total seating without meeting drinking-place standards, and the usual 10% ancillary-food limit that a commission can modify. Staff said either path would require findings and possible tenant improvements: reverting to a drinking place could require removing major cooking equipment; amending to a full-line restaurant would permit the existing kitchen but remove that drinking-place entitlement for potential use elsewhere if the property owner chooses to relinquish it.

Several commissioners emphasized the town's policy limiting formal drinking-place entitlements to three locations and noted the community preference against additional stand-alone bars. At the same time they acknowledged AW Shucks's unique, incremental evolution over decades and recommended caution about rapid enforcement that would disrupt a business operating in good faith.

The commission gave direction to staff to research and prepare clearer options to "clean up the books," including a path that would keep the drinking-place entitlement with the landowner while issuing an operator-specific use permit recognizing the current full-line restaurant operation, and to return with findings that reconcile building permits, business licensing and use-permit history. No enforcement action or final amendment was adopted at the meeting; staff will bring a follow-up report and recommended resolution to a future meeting.