The city of Boulder and its liquor licensing authority have asked the Boulder County District Court to dismiss a case filed by the owner of Hazel’s Beverage World that challenged an expansion of the liquor license held by Whole Foods.

The city claimed in a May 8 filing that Hazel’s owner, Boulder attorney Bruce Dierking, did not have standing to challenge the licensing authority’s decision because he doesn’t personally live in the designated district where Whole Foods is located.

Dierking has challenged that motion, but in the meantime another group, including the company behind Hazel’s Beverage World and Lynda Gibbons, owner of the commercial real estate firm Gibbons-White Inc., which is located in the Whole Food district, has filed another lawsuit that attempts to overcome the city’s stance on legal standing to challenge licensing decisions.

The original case, filed Feb. 18, 2026, pitted the owner of Hazel’s, with store at 1955 28th St., against the liquor licensing board, the city, and Whole Foods, 2905 Pearl St. Dierking claimed that the city failed to adequately review Whole Foods’ application for expansion and refused to permit entry of information into the process that would have exposed misrepresentations in the application.

The Boulder Beverage Licensing Authority approved Whole Foods’ application on Feb. 5.

The lawsuit alleged that Whole Foods presented faulty neighborhood survey information to support its application and that its plans understated the footprint of its liquor beverage operation. Instead of 302 square feet, the submitted plans actually totalled between 824 square feet and 5,479 square feet, according to the lawsuit.

The lawsuit asked the court to vacate or overturn the licensing decision.

The city, however, contended in its motion for dismissal that Dierking was not eligible to challenge because he wasn’t personally affected as a resident of the neighborhood around Whole Foods, and that his ownership of Hazel’s placed him in a position of a business competitor, not an affected resident.

Dierking responded that he also owns other businesses in the neighborhood that would be affected and are not competitors in the liquor industry. The city then responded that those other businesses were not parties at the original hearing on the license and therefore not eligible to challenge the decision after the fact.

The new lawsuit, filed Tuesday, attempts to overcome those objections. It lists Hazel’s and its parent company, along with Lynda Gibbons and Gibbons-White, as affected parties in the neighborhood and also entities that were part of the original hearing and that objected to the license expansion for Whole Foods.

The new lawsuit claims abuse of discretion on the part of the licensing authority in excluding certain testimony and rebuttal exhibits, along with a claim that Whole Foods failed to establish a neighborhood need for the license modification.

Neither the city of Boulder nor Whole Foods chose to comment about the initial lawsuit, both saying that they don’t comment on pending litigation.

The original case is Bruce Dierking v. The Boulder Beverage Licensing Authority, et al, the city of Boulder, and Whole Foods Market Rocky Mountains/Southwest LP dba Whole Foods Market, case number 2026cv30173, filed in Boulder County District Court.

The new case is Integrity Retail Partners LLC, dba Hazel’s Beverage World; Lynda Gibbons; and Gibbons-White Inc. v. The Boulder Beverage Licensing Authority, et al; the city of Boulder; and WFM CW LLC formerly known as Whole Foods Market Rocky Mountains/Southwest, L.P. dba Whole Foods Market, case number 2026cv30437 filed May 19, 2026, in Boulder County District Court.

This article was first published by BizWest, an independent news organization, and is published under a license agreement. © 2026 BizWest Media LLC.