H500 - ABC Omnibus Legislation. (SL 2018-100)

Overview: S.L. 2018-100 makes various changes to the laws governing alcoholic beverages. Some of the provisions in this act include:

• Allows a commercial permittee to taste alcoholic beverages for quality control premises at premises other than the permittee's licensed commercial premises.
• Directs the Alcoholic Beverage Control (ABC) Commission to amend its rules to clarify that a distiller representative need not be present for the Commission, a privately owned bonded warehouse, or a local board to destroy distressed liquor bottles.
• Directs the Alcoholic Beverage Control Commission to amend its rules to allow placement of the mixed beverages tax stamp on any vertical surface of a spirituous liquor bottle.
• Amends the definition of "restaurant" and "sports club" for the purpose of ABC permitting to clarify that the premises of an 18-hole golf course includes the entire course and the parking lot.
• Allows sports and entertainment venues to obtain certain ABC permits.
• Makes several changes to allow nonprofit organizations to hold fund-raising raffles and authorize reissuance of certain one-time ABC permits.
• Allows sale of branded merchandise at malt beverage, wine, and spirituous liquor tastings.
• Authorizes the transfer of a wholesaler business to a family member in situations other than the death of the owner.
• Removes a supplier's right to match and reassign to a designee the right to purchase an ownership interest in a wholesaler when an interest in a wholesaler business is sold, assigned, or transferred, except for a supplier whose total annual gross sales of the supplier's malt beverages sold by the selling wholesaler total no more than five percent of the selling wholesaler's total annual gross sales of wine and malt beverages in dollars.
• Prohibits a supplier from acquiring, possessing, or otherwise maintaining an ownership interest in a wholesaler except as specifically authorized by law.

For a complete explanation of these and the additional changes contained in the act, please see the full summary of the act.

Except as otherwise stated in the full summary of this act, the act became effective June 26, 2018.