SALT LAKE CITY — An annual bill on alcohol policy will add more bar licenses, but some beer brands could potentially disappear from grocery and convenience store shelves.
The omnibus bill, run every year in the Republican supermajority legislature, will make tweaks to Utah liquor laws. In an interview with FOX 13 News, Sen. Jerry Stevenson, R-Layton — who handles liquor legislation for the Utah State Senate — said they would address a chronic problem of a lack of bar licenses.
"I think we’re going to take care of the license issue upfront," he said, cautioning that negotiations over the bill were ongoing.
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Bar licenses in Utah are doled out by an arbitrary population quota of one per 10,200 people. But that finite of a number has led to some businesses waiting years for a coveted license. To solve the issue in the short term, Sen. Stevenson said they would take licenses from fading fraternal lodges.
"We’re looking at taking those back and converting them to basically a full-service license and putting them back in the pool," he told FOX 13 News. "What that will buy us is buy us time to do a study. We’re going to go in an do an extensive study on alcohol licenses with other control states, see how we fit into that."
The study will help the state decide if the quota should be revisited. Re-working the licenses temporarily should free up about 40 new bar licenses, Sen. Stevenson said. In addition, the omnibus bill will create 13 new airport liquor licenses for newly arriving businesses at Salt Lake City International Airport.
In another big change, the bill will make a change to liquor laws in restaurants. Right now, Utah law forbids you from ordering a drink in the bar area of a restaurant and taking it to your table. Sen. Stevenson said by allowing "portability," it avoids over-consumption.
"You’re not going to have to slug that down," he said.
Sen. Stevenson said for public safety reasons, the bill will allow customers to carry their own drink to the table in a restaurant.
"In this day and age? We’re not sure it’s a good idea that a young woman should not be in control of her drink. That’s a policy that will be in the bill," he said.
Lawmakers are so far unwilling to legalize mini-bottles. The legislature gave Utah's Department of Alcoholic Beverage Services Commission the authority to decide whether to allow them to be sold in state-run liquor stores. Sen. Stevenson said he was fine with that, but others pushed back.
The bill will also not address another issue: flavored malt beverages. A number of popular hard seltzer drinks were yanked from grocery and convenience store shelves and put in DABS stores because of how they're brewed, the type of flavorings they use and whether that exceeds the alcohol content legally allowed for beer in Utah.
"There’s still pressure to not do anything there," Sen. Stevenson said. "I think it has to do a lot with there are certain groups that would prefer not to make alcohol more enticing."
But not tweaking the legal definition of "beer" in Utah could have a bigger problem, said Kate Bradshaw, the director of the Utah Beer Wholesalers Association, which represents some major beer manufacturers. She warned that some popular beer brands with flavorings (like apricot, raspberry or orange) could find themselves pulled from convenience stores and grocery stores and put in DABS stores.
"Utah uses these unique definitions for flavorings and standards. They aren’t tied to national standards. So sometimes if we get that nuance wrong, it has these cascading impacts," Bradshaw said.
She was hopeful negotiations on the bill would lead to those brands staying put.
"We’ve still got four weeks. I’m hopeful the legislature will be able to see the wisdom of making these definitions consistent," she said.
Liquor legislation in Utah is often a complicated dance involving a number of competing interests including alcohol abuse prevention groups, hospitality and restaurant groups, manufacturers, distilleries, brewers and lawmakers. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, a powerful political and cultural influence in the state, also has been known to weigh in on liquor bills. Lawmakers have expressed a desire to ensure public safety and guarding against youth alcohol consumption while also being business-friendly and welcoming to tourists.
The omnibus liquor bill will be made public later this week.
"This won’t make everyone happy, but it’s a step in a direction," Sen. Stevenson said.
