By JOHN KOZIOL

Staff Writer

LACONIA — After restricting the number of people allowed in Bike Week beer tents last year, the State Liquor Commission is considering further limiting such patronage.

The SLC will hold a public hearing on April 10 on several amendments to its rules, including a proposal not to grant extension-of-service permits for areas larger than three times the licensed seating of the permittee.

The hearing begins at 9 a.m. and will be held at the SLC’s Enforcement Bureau in Concord.

Depending on how quickly they are adopted, the new regulations could potentially go into effect for this year’s Bike Week, said Aidan Moore, chief of the SLC’s Enforcement Bureau, on Tuesday.

A representative from the Broken Spoke Saloon said his business and several others in The Weirs, which sought, and after considerable effort, obtained extension-of-service permits for Bike Week 2002, have again retained the law offices of Kelley & Tilsley of Manchester and will be challenging the SLC changes.

Attorney W. John Deachman of Kelley & Tilsley said he would have to contact his clients, who last year included the Broken Spoke, the Weirs Beach Lobster Pound and JT’s Bar-B-Q, before commenting publicly on the proposed SLC amendments but did agree that the amendment on occupancy could have a major impact on them.

Last June, on the cusp of Bike Week, the SLC cited public safety concerns in denying the extension-of-service permits sought by the Lobster Pound, JT’s and the Broken Spoke Saloon, all on Endicott Street North; Educate America Inc., which had been planning to operate out of the Weirs Beach Drive-In, and Donna Jean’s Diner on Weirs Boulevard.

The commission partially reversed itself after the Lobster Pound, JT’s and the Broken Spoke — which had initially indicated that they could serve between 2,000 and 2,500 patrons — each agreed to have a maximum occupancy of 1,000 people in their beer tents.

The SLC’s new occupancy rules, however, would be even more prohibitive than the conditions the commission set last year.

According to the SLC, there are 78 licensed seats at the Lobster Pound; 145 at the Broken Spoke; 118 at JT’s and 95 at Donna Jean’s.

None of those businesses has yet sought permission from the Laconia Motorcycle Technical Review Committee (MTRC) to have a beer tent. The SLC requires that applicants obtain local permission for a beer tent before it will consider an extension-of-service request.

A representative of the Laconia Planning Department, which coordinates the MTRC applications, said on Tuesday that the Lobster Pound has asked to be on the MTRC’s May agenda at which time it will seek approval for a beer tent. JT’s has submitted a site plan, which does not include a beer tent. JT’s plan has yet to be scheduled for a hearing by the MTRC.

Earlier this year, the MTRC okayed beer tents at the Paradise Beach Club on Lakeside Avenue and at the Naswa Resort on Weirs Boulevard.

The SLC said the Paradise has licensed seating for 322 patrons between its dining room and lounge while the Naswa cumulatively has licensed seating for 315 people at its dining room, lounge and outdoor beach bar.

Moore said that at the SLC’s April 10 public hearing, "any person can come in and offer comments to the commission supporting or opposing or offering their own language" on the rule changes.

Among the other proposed changes that the SLC will review on April are one that requires it to consider "submission or testimony from local, state or federal officials that the (extension of service) constitutes a hazard to the public safety or welfare" and to "deny any such extension if, in their judgment, the testimony or submission is credible."

If, after the hearing, the commission is satisfied "that the rules as they have been written are adequate to address the issues and that they have received no comment" to the contrary, it would forward the amendments to the Legislature’s Joint Legislative Rules Committee which would review and then hold another public hearing on them, explained Moore.

The committee can then adopt the rules "in whole or in part," he said.

Should the SLC at the April 10 public hearing deem that the changes needed to be significantly modified, however, then the commission would hold another hearing, Moore said.