SALT LAKE CITY — The Utah Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control is proposing to change its name, dropping the word "control" in favor of "services."
DABC Executive Director Tiffany Clason said the name change would reflect the mission of the agency and improve public perception of what they do.
"We feel like a name change, taking out that word 'control' and inserting the word 'services,' — Department of Alcoholic Beverage Services — better reflects all of the services that we provide in our vision and determination again to be customer-service focused," she said in an interview with FOX 13 on Wednesday.
Clason floated the idea in a meeting of the Utah State Legislature's Business and Labor Interim Committee, where she presented a transition team report, highlighting the Cox administration's recommendations to improve the agency. The DABC has already made some consumer-friendly changes, including adding coolers at new liquor stores to sell cold beer. She also said the DABC would like to implement "click and collect," which is the ability for a customer to order liquor online and pick it up at a state-run liquor store.
"We want to do that. Let's move forward," she said, adding that conversations were under way with the legislature to make it happen.
In the committee hearing, lawmakers reacted favorably to Clason's report, but some did not appear to back away from the "control" aspect of the Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control (though they did not exactly weigh in on the name change). It has been discussed with a legislative alcohol policy workgroup.
"The state still, obviously, is regulating in making sure that we are public safety focused, prevention education focused," Clason said.
The name change is expected to appear in an omnibus liquor bill that may also address a lack of bar licenses in Utah.
