Month: February 2020

Several WA Wine Bills Continue to Advance in Olympia

Today is the 40th day of the 2020 legislative session, with two-thirds of this year’s legislative journey over and the final 20 days looming ahead. The Senate and House passed many bills out of their respective chambers, with focuses on health care, mental health, the environment, affordable housing, and to a lesser extent small business regulatory changes and reform. For the Washington wine industry, we had a very strong floor session with four of our priority bills surviving the process and continuing on into the next phase of the legislative process! Here is an updated list of the Washington wine bills that survived the floor session cutoff process and are still alive. These include:

WWI authored legislation:
SB 6392: Creating a local wine industry association license

Other:
HB 2050: Creating the Washington wine specialty license plate
SB 6095: Allowing common carrier activities not prohibited under the three-tier system (supports the Alaska Airlines Wine-Flies-Free Program among other promotional opportunities with airlines, cruise ships, and trains that cross state lines)
SB 5006: Allowing, in a limited amount, Washington wine to be sold at a craft brewery and Washington beer to be sold at a winery and satellite tasting rooms

The Legislature now shifts to spending the final days voting on survivng bills out of the House and Senate committees for the next week, then finishing the 2020 session with final votes on bills out of the full House or Senate. As always we will keep you our members informed as our work within the 2020 legislative session continues towards a March 12 finish.