(PD) - The Sonoma City Council on Monday will take another look at a proposal to somewhat increase the regulation of wine tasting rooms and wine bars.

City staff has recommended adoption of the proposed ordinance, which comes after a year of discussions at both the council and the Planning Commission.

It would define new hours of operation for the facilities and limit the number of special events they could hold a year.

The most significant change, though, would apply to wine bars — which can pour drinks from more than one winery or brewery. They would need use permits to open, said David Goodison, the city's planning director.

“The main thing that the council and the Planning Commission have wanted all along is to make a clear distinction between wine tasting facilities and wine bar/taprooms and to require that the latter have use permit review,” he said.

The city has three wine bars now, said Goodison, and 20 tasting rooms, most on or in the vicinity of the city's iconic plaza. An effort to cap the numbers of both types of business arose last year after the narrow defeat of a ballot measure to limit hotels and their expansion.

Former Councilman Larry Barnett, who led the campaign to limit hotel sizes and also to cap tasting room numbers, said the ordinance the council will look at Monday is “diametrically opposed to what I was hoping for.”

Barnett characterized the proposed rules as powerless, saying they would open the door to a scenario where a glut of wine tasting facilities will end up “degrading themselves and their environment.”