Two Wayland businesses, X-Golf Wayland and the China Rose Restaurant, have been penalized for violating Wayland bylaws and state liquor laws.
The Select Board agreed with Wayland Chief of Police Ed Burman’s findings and recommended penalties at two separate hearings on June 16. He recommended a one-year probation and Training for Intervention Procedures (TIPS) for the X-Golf server and a two-day suspension and TIPS training for all China Rose employees. TIPS is a certification program for training people on how to responsibly serve or sell alcohol.
Burman reported that X-Golf allegedly served alcohol to an intoxicated customer who was involved in a one-vehicle accident after leaving the premises. He also said the server was not TIPs trained. China Rose was caught serving a minor by a waiter who was not TIPs trained during a compliance check.
Burman reported that an officer was called to the scene an accident on April 7 at 10:21 p.m. near Town Center. The driver was reported to have a blood alcohol concentration well above the legal limit. Upon the officer’s visit to X-Golf the next day, he determined that the intoxicated driver had signed a receipt for eight beers.
The officer also asked to see the TIPS certification for the server, but the manager could not provide one. Massachusetts requires all servers to be certified within the first 60 days of their employment, but the server (who was hired in September) had never taken the course. Elizabeth Lashway, legal counsel for X-Golf, agreed the server was not certified and said that the owner had instituted new procedures to ensure that all servers receive TIPS training within 30 days and they would review employees with the town bylaws and Alcohol Beverage Control regulations annually. She said the server was now TIPS-certified.
Lashway argued that X-Golf should not be found guilty of serving an intoxicated person based on case law since the town would need to prove that the individual was intoxicated before he was served the last drink. She argued that the driver was part of a foursome and that there was a time gap of an hour between the time listed on the receipt and the time of the accident. She showed photos of 13 glasses for four people and said that there was no way of knowing how much each person drank and that different people have different alcohol tolerance levels. She also said that an X-Golf employee had talked to the party and no one in the group appeared to be intoxicated. The group left the restaurant at 10 p.m. X-Golf has been operating in business for six years and this is their first violation.
Compliance check
Wayland Police conducted a compliance check with advance notice at nine restaurants in town. According to Burman, they did this by hiring an 18-year-old, gave him a $20 dollar bill and told him to order a Budweiser. After he successfully order a beer at China Rose, he went out to the parking lot to get the police sergeant waiting for him in the car. When the officer questioned the server (who is a member of the family that owns the restaurant) about serving to a minor, the server told him that the 18-year-old “is here all the time and I serve him all the time.”
But Burman said that was not true. Ken Baric, China Rose’s legal counsel, that he would not argue the charge but listed some mitigating circumstances. He said that the owner who manages the restaurant every day was at home recuperating from surgery and that they were taking corrective measures to ensure everyone received TIPS training. The server had received 360 Training, but this program is not accepted by the town’s bylaws.
China Rose, which had two prior violations in 2014 for serving a minor and in 2018 for lack of TIPS training is under new management as of 2023. After deliberating, the Select Board agreed with Burman’s recommendation to suspend China Rose’s license on June 26 and 27, require every employee to take TIPS training within 15 days, and send proof of certifications to the Wayland Police Department. Burman said that the Select Board agrees with his recommendations 95% of the time.
Alcohol penalties get more punitive with each violation. “We don’t tolerate and won’t tolerate any liquor law violations,” he said.
