At 190 proof, grain alcohol is more than twice as potent as the typical whisky or vodka. It is odorless, tasteless and highly flammable, useful for sterilizing medical equipment or cleaning machinery. To keep people from mixing it into stiff drinks, the Executive Council tried to ban grain alcohol a decade ago. So Councilor Peter Spaulding was stunned when a liquor-store clerk offered to sell him a bottle this week.

"It's poison," Spaulding said yesterday, telling Gov. John Lynch and the Executive Council about his discovery. "It shouldn't have anything to do with the liquor stores."

Spaulding said the councilors had discussed the dangers of grain alcohol a few times in the past decade. A few years ago, Spaulding said, the Liquor Commission promised to stop selling grain alcohol in its stores. Instead, the commission was supposed to offer it only by direct sale - not at retail locations - for those who need it for industrial or medical uses, he said.

Spaulding decided to check on that policy during a visit to the state liquor store on Fort Eddy Road in Concord on Tuesday, he said. The clerk quickly offered to sell him a bottle of grain alcohol from the back room for $11.99, he said.

That was no rogue clerk. The Liquor Commission's website yesterday showed that grain alcohol -under the brand name Clear Spring - was in stock at 36 of New Hampshire's 76 state liquor stores, at $11.99 for a 750-millileter bottle or $143.88 for a case. Clear Spring is 95 percent alcohol.

Spaulding raised the issue at a breakfast meeting with the governor and council yesterday. Fellow Councilor Ruth Griffin said she was also upset to learn that grain alcohol could be purchased easily. The Liquor Commission agreed to stop selling it except for professional use at some point during the administration of former governor Jeanne Shaheen, either in the late 1990s or early this decade, Spaulding and Griffin recalled.

Griffin, a retired nurse who represents the Seacoast, said she was worried about college students at the University of New Hampshire and elsewhere drinking grain alcohol.

The governor promised to look into the matter. "I'll call Tony and find out what's going on," Lynch said, referring to Tony Maiola, chairman of the Liquor Commission. The three-member commission regulates the sale of alcohol in New Hampshire and controls the state's liquor stores, which generate more than $100 million in revenue a year.

Other states have banned or controlled the sale of grain alcohol in recent years. In 1999, the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board outlawed the sale of grain alcohol to the general public, making it available only to permit holders through special order. West Virginia's Alcohol Beverage Control Administration pulled grain alcohol from store shelves last year.

Maiola told the Monitor yesterday that he was surprised to learn the council was talking about grain alcohol again. He said he thought the issue was resolved a decade ago. He recalled that the commission had settled the matter by removing grain alcohol from the shelves but continuing to sell it from the back rooms of liquor stores. He said he sent a letter to store managers advising them to limit grain-alcohol sales to dentists, doctors and others who need it for professional use.

"They're only supposed to sell it to doctors and hospitals and stuff. They're not supposed to sell it to you if you go in," Maiola said. Among other precautions, he said, the commission removed grain alcohol from the Hanover store, which is located near the Dartmouth College campus. But the Liquor Commission did not want to ban the sale of grain alcohol outright, he said.

"We can't take it away from the doctors and hospitals," Maiola said. Other businesses need it, too, he said, noting a company in his hometown, Newport, that uses grain alcohol to make paint and clean industrial tubes. (next page »)