LANSING — New legislation would make it easier for Macomb Community College to obtain a liquor license for scheduled events at its conference spaces.

For many years, the college has held a license allowing liquor sales at the Macomb Center for the Performing Arts and its Professional Development Center, both at its Clinton Township campus.

Selling liquor in the John Lewis Student Community Center and the Sports & Expo Center, on the school’s Warren campus, however, currently requires a special license for each event.

“The college is seeking the license to remove this cumbersome and, sometimes challenging, extra step for South Campus conferences,” Jeanne Nicol, the executive director of communications and public relations for the college, wrote in an email.

The South Campus hosts events throughout the year, including the Michigan Defense Expo and the Michigan Association of Professional Court Reporters’ annual conference.

Then-presidential candidate Donald Trump rallied supporters at the Sports & Expo Center four days before the 2024 election.

“Macomb County is the third-largest county in the state, but we don’t have a university and we don’t have any type of convention center,” said lead sponsor Rep. Joseph Aragona, R-Clinton Township.

“What we do have is Macomb Community College.”

Aragona, who chairs the House Regulatory Reform Committee, said college President James Sawyer requested the Legislature address the inconvenience of obtaining a liquor license for individual events at the Warren campus.

He said he’s heard of no opposition.

The legislation could be passed in time for the college’s summer semester, Aragona added.

Aragona said the legislation isn’t intended to allow alcohol sales at sporting events — something other colleges have experimented with since Gov. Gretchen Whitmer signed a law allowing them to do so in 2023.

Since 2024, Michigan State University has sold at least 149,101 alcoholic beverages during two completed and three in-progress sports seasons, according to Kat Cooper, the chief communications officer for the university’s Student Life & Engagement division.

Drink prices ranged from $10 to $12 in 2024, according to the Lansing State Journal.

That means MSU likely brought in about $1.5 million in revenue from the sales.

On the other hand, Oakland University discontinued alcohol sales at its men’s basketball games after a two-game pilot program.

After factoring in staffing costs and related costs the revenues did not exceed expenses — amounting to a net loss of $831.85 — Oakland University Athletic Director Steve Waterfield wrote in an email.

Aragona said that if Macomb Community College becomes interested in selling alcohol at sporting events, it could, for example, set up a bar area for basketball games at the Sports & Expo Center.

The House bill has been referred to the Regulatory Reform Committee. An identical Senate bill introduced by Paul Wojno, D-Warren, and six others is in the Regulatory Affairs Committee.