WA State SB5060 Passes and is awaiting Governor's Signature!

[BrewDog]

Washington Homemade Beer and Winemakers, (club reps please disseminate)

On Saturday, April 18th, the amended Senate Bill 5060 passed the Senate
again unanimously and now will be heading to the Governor's desk to be signed into law.

She can decide to not sign the bill or veto it. While we don't expect
this to happen, you can make one call or send one e-mail to help seal the deal.
Please call (360-902-4111) and/or write the Governor a message asking for her to
sign Senate Bill 5060 when it comes to her desk. (You can also call the
legislative hotline to leave a message at 1-800-562-6000).

You can send the Governor a message through this tool:
http://www.governor.wa.gov/contact/default.asp

This really is the final step and we will officially be able to enjoy homebrew
and wine outside our houses starting July 25th (pretty sure of that date). Make
one last call to finish this up!

As always, you can find all of the current details at
http://www.wahomebrewers.org/legal
Cheers,
Mark Emiley
WAHA Executive Chair

[BrewDog]

Washington Homemade Beer and Wine Makers,

Raise a glass of homebrew in celebration!

At 2:00 today Governor Gregoire signed Senate Bill 5060 in the presence of Mark Emiley, Tim Hayner, and Tom Schmidlin, the three founding members of WAHA. Starting July 26th (estimate) it will be legal to enjoy your homemade beer and wine in private, but as a community! This is a great day for homebrewing in Washington!

The wording of the final bill can be found here (http://apps.leg.wa.gov/documents/billdocs/2009-10/Pdf/Bills/Senate%20Passed%20Legislature/5060.PL.pdf) but in short, by law, you will be able to finally LEGALLY take your homemade beer and wine out of your house to enjoy privately with your friends, family, and very importantly, organized events like club meetings (and of course competitions or exhibitions). The constraint on only judges tasting the beer or wine is gone and the impossible restriction on returning beers or wines from competitions is gone. Also, very importantly, the limit of 1 gallon has been raised to 20 gallons which will mean that transportation in kegs will finally be legal.

Thank you to everyone who made the calls and sent the messages. Thanks to everyone’s effort, we made this homebrewed bill successful.

Now that we are done with this effort, WE WANT YOU TO DO TWO LAST THINGS!!! First of all, none of this would have been possible without Senator Jacobsen agreeing to sponsor this bill and that wouldn’t have been possible without Arlen Harris helping connect us. Please take a minute to either call (360) 786-7690) or e-mail (http://www1.leg.wa.gov/senate/Jacobsen) Senator Jacobsen and let him know how much you appreciate his sponsorship.

If you see Arlen around, please thank him for his help! (He always appreciates some good homebrew). Arlen has already helped changed the face of Washington craft brewing and through his help with connecting us with Senator Jacobsen has helped advanced our homebrewing community. Thanks, Arlen.

Also, more than likely your legislators voted for the bill (there were only three representatives who didn’t, you can view the bill roll calls here: http://apps.leg.wa.gov/billinfo/Summary.aspx?bill=5060&year=2009). Take another minute and call or e-mail them to let you know that you appreciate their support. By letting them know that the homemade beer and wine communities noticed, they’ll keep us in mind in future bills. They know we exist (and can be loud when we need to). Don’t let them forget.

Congratulations again on gaining a new right. The right to bear homebrew!

Cheers,

Mark Emiley

WAHA Executive Chair