Springboro to consider outdoor drinking area; Warped Wing construction delayed

The public hearing required to establish a Designated Outdoor Refreshment Area at the Wright Station redevelopment here will be held Thursday at Springboro City Hall.

Springboro City Council plans to hold the public hearing and take care of other city business during an open meeting at the city building.

Mayor John Agenbroad said council members and staff were expected to to attend the meeting, with steps taken in recognition of the potential risk of infection.

“We’ll be practicing legislative distancing,”Agenbroad said, adding the city might go to teleconferencing - the route already chosen by some other local governments - in the future.

Agenbroad said Springboro officials want to establish the DORA in time for opening of the the Warped Wing Brewing Company Barrel Room & Smokery and other events planned this summer at Wright Station, located on the northwest corner of Ohio 73 and Ohio 741 in Springboro.

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“We have not heard anybody that’s opposed to it,” Agenbroad said. “We’re not going to delay it. We need to get it done.”

On Tuesday, no construction was under way at the Springboro Warped Wing site, but Cassano’s Pizza and Subs and Heroes Pizza House were serving carry-out and delivery orders to-go orders from Wright Station.

Nick Bowman, co-founder in charge of sales & marketing at Warped Wing, was handling pick-up and delivery orders at the Dayton microbrewery.

He said construction in Springboro stopped with the statewide stay-at-home orders and indicated a June-July opening was unlikely, unless work could resume in coming weeks.

RELATED: Middletown suspending DORA district due to coronavirus outbreak

Otherwise “we will be forced to push out our opening while this kind of new reality is in effect,” Bowman said.

While excited about the Springboro opening, Bowman said at Warped Wing, “Our focus has shifted to survival and maintaining our current business in any way we can.”

Construction has been down about a week, but should resume before the end of the week, according to Jerad Barnett, president and CEO at Synergy development.

The temporary shutdown is not expected to delay completion of the Warped Wing work, Barnett added.

Rather than the entire 62-acre Urban Village District established around the crossroads intersection, the Springboro DORA area will be limited to the 7.8 acre Wright Station area at this point.

“The purpose of the proposed legislation is to approve an ordinance creating an outdoor refreshment area and establishing requirements to ensure public health and safety within such area,” Assistant City Manager Greg Shackelford said in a staff memo.

Other liquor license holders within the DORA are to include Heroes, Cassano’s and Springboro Community Theatre, according to the application to the State of Ohio Department of Commerce.

Security and sanitation plans are part of the application.

RELATED: Lebanon wants to add outdoor drinking to downtown district

The Wright Station DORA would be open noon to midnight, seven days a week.

The local legislation will go through multiple readings.

If anyone wants to raise questions, Agenbroad said they can attend Thursday’s meeting or later sessions to push for changes.

“We can always go back to the drawing board,” Agenbroad added.


Springboro DORA Hearing

Thursday, April 2

6:30 p.m. work session

7 p.m. formal meeting

320 W. Central Ave., Springboro

937-748-4343

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