GOP has more time to drink at convention

Last call should arrive two hours later for Republicans than Democrats at their national convention, giving GOPers more time to celebrate or down their sorrows.

Minnesota’s legislature has approved a bill allowing municipalities in the Twin Cities to extend their bar hours to as late as 4 a.m. – but only for the Sept. 1-4 Republican National Convention. Twin Cities bars now close at 2 a.m.

{mosads}Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak and the city council already signed off on a resolution endorsing the idea and asking for the state legislature’s approval, according to Rybak spokesman Jeremy Hanson.

As a result, he said, Minneapolis bars likely will be granted the longer hours, although Hanson noted that the city council still has yet to formally act. Hanson added that the state measure gives the city permission to extend bar hours up to 4 a.m., meaning it could choose to instead to extend bar hours from 2 a.m. to 3 a.m., for example.

It’s less certain if the other Twin City, St. Paul, will follow suit. In April, its city council voted 4-3 against a resolution asking the legislature to take action, according to reports in the Twin Cities media.

“It would be nothing short of a nightmare,” council member Dave Thune told the Minneapolis Star-Tribune at the time. He added that he wanted to spare residents of his downtown district the sight of “puking Republican lobbyists” in the streets.

However, Thune changed his tune in comments earlier this month to the Twin Cities weekly City Pages. He noted that the defeated resolution would have allowed bar hours to be extended for 11 days, including the weekends surrounding the convention. The move by the legislature would only impact bar hours on Sept. 1-4, all weekdays, and Thune said he thought the St. Paul council might go along with that.

The GOP convention is taking place in St. Paul’s Xcel Energy Center, but hotels and restaurants throughout the Twin Cities metro area are expecting heavy traffic.

Bars in Denver, which hosts the Aug. 25-28 Democratic National Convention, also close at 2 a.m. But the mayor’s office has received no requests for extended hours and has no plans to do so, according to Sue Cobb, a spokeswoman for Mayor John Hickenlooper.

Cobb said convention events will typically wrap up at 9 p.m. Mountain time in Denver to ensure that big convention events are held in prime time television viewing hours on the East Coast. That should leave plenty of time for convention-goers to attend parties and experience the Denver nightlife, Cobb said.

Hanson said Minneapolis sees the convention as a “once in a lifetime” happening. Extending the bar hours is intended to ensure that people have time to go out after attending late night parties and formal events, he said.