Oregon squashes Home Brew Competitions

[Brewpastor]

I sent an email to the powers that be and received the following reply:

"In consultation with the Department of Justice, we have received an initial analysis of the statute regulating home brewing (ORS 471.403) which also indicates that the law only allows for consumption of home brews in the home. The home brewers lose their exemption to craft brew without a license when the home brew is consumed outside of the home.

The Department of Justice’s guidance certainly requires us to look at the competitions in a different way than we have before. It’s completely understandable that home beer and wine makers would be disappointed. We know how important the home brew and wine competitions are for artisans and professional hopefuls. We expect a final analysis from the Department of Justice next week. Although we are hopeful that there may be some other way of interpreting this statute to allow these events to continue, we anticipate that the initial analysis will stand.

The OLCC is already working with Representative Mike Schaufler and Senator Floyd Prozanski to draft language for legislative consideration in the next session. We ask that those people who are concerned with this issue help us gain support and cooperation from the legislature to get the law revised and in effect in time for next summer’s fair season.
Please let me know if you have any other questions."

 

[Beernik]

Email him back and remind him that the intent of the law is to prohibit sales of homebrew, not to prevent out-of-home drinking of homebrew.

 

[david_42]

California and Washington also had to re-write their laws on homebrewing because of similar idiocy. Unfortunately, January is the earliest a new law can be passed.

 

[Denny]

Email him back and remind him that the intent of the law is to prohibit sales of homebrew, not to prevent out-of-home drinking of homebrew.

Everyone knows what the intent is, but it's the letter of the law that they enforce. Just like the policeman who gives you a ticket for speeding, that's their job. The 2 senators mentioned are ones we're working with.

 

[Beernik]

Specifically I was referring to the:

"Although we are hopeful that there may be some other way of interpreting this statute to allow these events to continue, we anticipate that the initial analysis will stand."

The governing board has meetings, probably monthly. You get on the agenda and you as your politician to show up and talk about the legislative intent of the law and see if they will reverse their interpretation.

It's called appealing the board's determination. If you can get your politician involved in appealing it before the board, you may not have to wait for a new law to be passed.

 

[Denny]

Based on conversations and communications with the OLCC, I think it's pretty unlikely they'd change their interpretation. Even the AHA has said "While the OLCC's change of position caught us all by surprise, since there have been homebrew competitions held in Oregon for over 20 years, the current OLCC position does seem a reasonable interpretation of the actual language in the alcohol code regarding homebrewing". But I'll bring your suggestion up and see what happens.

 

[Dunerunner]

I would think a 22 year president has been set and, the State Fair as well as numerous County Fairs have been participatory . Indeed, the Oregon Craft Brewing industry sprang from the home brewing community. It is hard for me to believe that as cash strapped as Oregon is that they would want to change their position, after such a long period of time, having ignored the fact that home brewers transport and share their brew.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out.

 

[Denny]

Well, I don't see that $$ has much to do with it. There's certainly no money to be made or last due to the new interpretation. As the AHA release said, although it's a big change, it's a reasonable interpretation of the law. Maybe the real question is "How did they miss it for the last XXX years?" And lest people think this all started with the state fair, it was well before that. Here's some background. I won't name the person who wrote this letter to the OHBA organizers, but it kinda explains the genesis. That person then contacted Ted Hausotter, who contacted me, and we swung into action.

"We contacted the OLCC in February about the 2010
Slurp-n-Burp as we always have. Everything was OK'ed this year as it had
been the last 5 years. About a month after S-n-B, our rep forwarded
information about the reinterpretation of the statute. She was only trying
to let us know (way ahead of time) that there may be a problem with S-n-B
for next year (2011). From what we know, this entire re-evaluation came
about from either a competition or a homebrewers meeting at Deschutes in
Bend. All we were getting was a heads-up."

 

[rico567]

I am frankly flabbergasted at this whole thing, given Oregon's rep in the home / craft brew universe. What's next, Congress going to do something sensible?

 

[Dunerunner]

Denny.......The plot thickens!

So, as it stands; it looks like any competitions in Oregon the remainder of this year are out the window!

Are you still allowed to do BJCP Classes???

 

[agroff383]

In a conversation with a local BATF agent I was told that in his opinion Home brew can only be consumed in the home in which it was brewed and anything else is a violation of federal law. He also said he was more concerned about the T and F portions of his agency and probably would never do anything about the A.

Who on here is acutally intimidated by having a homebrew competition in Oregon, how about tonight? A raid on your competition? Is there going to be a SWAT team smashing all your bottles?

Are you guys seriously worried about it? Im not trying to be a dick, but if I want to transport a case of brews I made to my friends house 2 hours away, I am sure as hell not going to let an unenforced law get in my way. I could give two ****s if I violate federal law in that manner. Its a ridiculous law to begin with.

And I would like to see what penalties there would be for such a small amount of beer. I could understand more if a restaurant proprietor was selling my kegged homebrew in his bar. That makes sense. Serving it to friends for free...no one's going to stop me from doing that, I got news for you.

Either way it was just some ******* little snitch that had to get their noses in other peoples buisness. Competiton at a STATE FAIR had been going on for 22 years and only now it was noticed that it was illegal? Please....LOL a homebrewer must have pissed off one of the board members. I hope they overturn it for everyone's sake so other states don't catch on and worry everyone.

 

[Dunerunner]

I'm not as concerned about anyone in my brew club, as I am about the host brewery losing it's license because it is viewed that they sanctioned the activity.

In a State where the failure of a commercial enterprise to verify or ask an ID on the sale of alcohol results in a near $2,000 fine, drinking while serving (bartender) results in the business being closed, I can only guess what might happen if a home brewer were to bring their brew into a brewery and share it with other brewers while an OLCC undercover agent or Decoy was on the premises. Yes, they do that here. List of resolved violations for May of this year: http://oregon.gov/OLCC/docs/violations_resolved/admin_violations_resolved_may2010.pdf

But you're in Pennsylvania, you don't have to worry about OLCC!

 

[david_42]

How extreme is OLCC? Under their rules, an OLCC-licensed server at an event is required to verify that every person they serve is over 21. It doesn't matter if the person has an official event wristband, the server is still liable for checking and both the server and the event can be fined. Another unenforced rule that is there any time OLCC wants to shut an event down.

 

[Denny]

Yeah, we're still doing the BJCP class since it doesn't involve serving homebrew.

 

[Yooper]

We're way ahead of that. The Oregon Home Brew Alliance has been formed to get the law changed. We have support from the AHA, at least 2 state legislators on board and draft language already being reviewed. The OHBA has reps from several clubs in OR. One thing I'd like to point out is that writing angry letters to the OLCC or legislators is not gonna help. We need these people on our side. The OLCC has already expressed an interest in getting the law changed. If anyone has specific questions, please contact. We have a website that will be online soon with info. In the meantime, you can sign up for a mailing list at http://groups.google.com/group/oregon-home-brewers-alliance .

Yeah, we're still doing the BJCP class since it doesn't involve serving homebrew.

Please keep us all informed on what we can do, both as forum members here and as AHA members, to help out.

 

[Denny]

Will do. BTW, nice meeting you at NHC, although I'm still disappointed that you weren't wearing that outfit!

 

[remilard]

How extreme is OLCC? Under their rules, an OLCC-licensed server at an event is required to verify that every person they serve is over 21. It doesn't matter if the person has an official event wristband, the server is still liable for checking and both the server and the event can be fined. Another unenforced rule that is there any time OLCC wants to shut an event down.

I worked at a grocery store in Oregon while in college and I recall that if I sold alcohol to a minor that I would personally be charged with a crime (and the store too I think). In every other state I have lived in it is the establishment that is charged. They are srs in Oregon.

In any case it seems abundantly clear that the OLCC doesn't want the law to stay the same, at the same time they can't tolerate anyone flaunting breaking of the law.

The lesson to be learned here is to go read your state laws and if they don't allow you to do what you think you need to do, work to change them pro-actively rather than waiting for something like this to happen.

I think the Oregon law clearly does not allow homebrewing competitions, it will be amended in the next legislative session, and it could have been amended years ago if someone had started the process then.

 

[remilard]

Let me add that I think the AHA should promulgate a model law which hopefully a fairly large number of states would adopt with no or few changes as this would make things far simpler.

 

[Denny]

That's kind of where they're at. Gary has done this enough times that we're able to use changes to other state's laws as a model for ours.

 

[lunchbox]

Yet another item in a long list of reasons to get rid of the government

fixed