Montgomery County Hospitality Resource Panel
Winner of Montgomery’s Best County Partnership Award
Department of Liquor Control, Director George Griffin

Hospitality Resource Panel Winners:

Montgomery County downtown and shopping centers are being confronted with increasing challenges to manage underage drinking and intoxication among a growing young adult population. Cultural and ethnic diversity, changes in lifestyles and students with more disposable income combine to make a dynamic marketplace. Developers and planners attempt to meet the needs of consumers, especially those seeking space to socialize that is safe, free from distractions and offering healthy choices in food and beverage.

On Monday, February 24, 2003, a group of 50 committed members of Montgomery County regulatory, law enforcement, education, business, development and young adult communities came together to discuss the rapidly approaching arrival of the Millennial Generation into adulthood and the need to find space for them to socialize. The Issue Forum on Hospitality and the Young Adult was organized by the Montgomery County Hospitality Resource Panel (MCHRP), an integral part of the Community Outreach Program in the Department of Liquor Control that unites community stakeholders to identify trends and issues in dining, entertainment, events and community redevelopment. The MCHRP facilitates collaboration among businesses and communities to create safe and vibrant places to socialize and linking resources from associations, agencies and educators.

The Issue Forum’s goals were to identify and bring together experts and key stakeholders able to address the ability of the community to meet the growing needs of young adults for places to socialize; to identify any barriers that exist; to stimulate debate about the place of young adults in the community; to identify spaces needed for them to socialize amongst themselves and with others; and to affect change in the public perception of these issues; and to identify “next steps” towards the ultimate goal of forming a consensus plan for the development of future places for mixed use and the management of existing ones. Examples of the final recommendations being worked on by the Montgomery County Hospitality Resource Panel include:

• Increase training/education of business owners and operators focusing on marketing strategies, trends and opportunities.
• Create more county mixed-age activities.
• Facilitate inter-agency coordination to share data and generate ideas for space for sociability for young adults.

An objective of the Panel is to share policies developed for mixed use activities and to adopt them in all county facilities. This partnership with the community exemplifies Montgomery’s Best.

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