Jonesboro, AR – (JonesboroRightNow.com) – Feb. 11, 2025 – Craighead County’s first-ever application for a private club permit died in a Quorum Court committee Monday night.

An ordinance would have allowed Social Improvement Inc.’s business, The 18 of Jonesboro, to apply for a private club permit. This allows it to serve alcoholic beverages. The ordinance went before the Public Services Committee.

The proposed location was 6151 Highway 18 between Jonesboro and Lake City.

“It’s a restaurant,” said Jim Lyons, an attorney with Lyons and Cone PLC. “They have permission from the landlord to turn this into a private club restaurant for the entertainment of its members and the members’ guests and that’s what we’re asking for.”

Lyons was representing the business owner, Mario Cesar Alvarado.

Jonesboro resident James Hinds spoke against the application, stating that citizens have previously voted to keep the county dry, so it should remain that way.

“We have had elections on whether or not to have alcohol in this town or to be dry. Every time the public has overwhelmingly voted to go dry,” Hinds said. “You only need to do what the people of Craighead County want to do, what they went to the polls and voted to ask you to do, which is to have a dry county.”

Josh Barnes, owner of Barnes Home Furnishings and Insight Mental Health and Psychological Testing, also spoke against the application. Both of his businesses are located on Highway 18 and would be directly across from the club’s proposed location.

“I don’t want the fighting. I don’t want the extra difficulty with worrying about my mother coming home in the afternoon,” he said. “I don’t wanna have to wonder ‘Is there somebody drunk that’s going to be pulling out of a business across the road?'”

Committee chair Richard Rogers read the ordinance after public comments, but it did not receive a motion to approve it from any committee members. Justice of the Peace District 1 Brad Noel, Justice of the Peace District 4 Linda Allison, and Justice of the Peace District 13 Kevin Williams also serve on the committee.

“Without a motion, it dies on the table,” Rogers said.

“For me, they said they were going to serve food, but they don’t have a kitchen, they didn’t have any restaurant experience,” Rogers told JRN. “I just don’t think all the facts were there and we didn’t feel comfortable moving forward.