Kempner residents may have the option in November, if a local option election petition gains the required number of signatures, to approve the sale of beer and wine within the city limits.

Kempner Brick Oven is applying for a petition to call for a local option liquor election Nov. 2. To circulate an official petition, the restaurant owners first must give Elections Administrator Dorothy Person a notice of intent to petition. The written notice must include the valid signatures of at least 10 registered voters from Kempner.

Once Ms. Person receives the notice of intent with the required signatures, she will determine how many names a local option election petition must contain. That number likely will be less than 100 and may be less than 80, Ms. Person said.

To be valid, each petition entry must contain the signer’s printed name, signature, residence address, county, date of signing and date of birth. A Kempner local option petition filed Jan. 15 fell 12 names short of the required 68, partly because not every signer included a date of birth, Ms. Person said.

“Liquor option election law is very specific,” the elections administrator said. “You must have the date of birth.”

Of all the information requested on the official petition forms, only the voter registration number is optional, Ms. Person said.

To file a successful petition, organizers likely will need to collect more than the minimum number of signatures to provide a cushion in case some signers write their names illegibly, do not live in Kempner or are not registered voters on the date the petition is issued.

Voter registration is available at the elections administrator’s office on the first floor of the brown brick county building on Pecan Street in Lampasas, as well as at city offices and area post offices. A potential voter also may find an application at www.sos.state.tx.us or may register to vote when applying for a driver’s license at the Texas Department of Public Safety.

A local option petition must be filed no later than 60 days after it is issued. If the 60th day after issuance falls on a Saturday, Sunday or legal holiday, the petition may be filed on the next regular business day.

Registered Kempner voters younger than 21 may sign the local option petition and may cast a ballot for or against the sale of beer and wine.

“Unfortunately they won’t be able to drink it for another three years,” Ms. Person said with a laugh.