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Eye On Boise

House panel narrowly passes liquor law revamp

The House Judiciary Committee has voted 8-6 in favor of revamping Idaho's 62-year-old quota system for liquor licenses, after one member switched sides from an earlier motion to kill the bill that failed on a tied vote. The move sends the Senate-passed bill to the full House; Gov. Butch Otter has been pushing the change for two years. Click below to read the full report from AP reporter John Miller.

ID House panel passes new liquor license plan
JOHN MILLER
Associated Press Writer

BOISE, Idaho (AP) — The House Judiciary Committee voted 8-6 Thursday to revamp Idaho's 62-year-old system of doling out liquor licenses after an apparent foe of the plan shifted sides at the last minute to send the measure to the House floor.

Rep. Steve Kren, R-Nampa, cast the deciding vote.

Only minutes earlier, he had voted to kill the bill on a motion that fell short on a 7-7 tie. After the hearing, Kren told The Associated Press that his sudden change of heart came after he decided it was best for the full House to weigh in.

"I saw it was locked up, and at least it deserved debate on the House floor," Kren said.

There are currently 1,150 licenses in Idaho; 584 people are on the state Alcohol Beverage Control's waiting list.

The reform measure, which has already cleared the Senate, would do away with Idaho's quota system that allows a single, state-issued liquor license for every 1,500 people in a city — a provision originally meant to promote temperance and morality when it became law in 1947.

Reform proponents, including aides to Gov. C.L. "Butch" Otter who helped draft the measure over two years, say reforms would resolve a license bottleneck that some blame for denting economic growth — as well as eliminate speculators on the current waiting list who aim to sell licenses for tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars, rather than open a bar themselves.

Under the new plan, cities and counties could issue unlimited new licenses, but for restaurants and lodging facilities only, not new bars. The measure includes mandatory bartender training and a new punishment scheme for owners of bars and restaurants that serve liquor to minors, including warnings for their first two violations in three years, rather than the immediate threat of license suspension.

Bartenders caught serving liquor to minors would face prosecution, a change that appealed to committee members who say the bartenders now can serve their "buddies" with little fear of retribution.

Rep. Liz Chavez, D-Lewiston, supported the plan. Her adopted son was diagnosed with fetal alcohol syndrome in 1989, and Chavez believes properly trained servers facing stricter prosecution decades ago might have been less likely to serve his underage birth mother when she was pregnant.

"At least one of her children might have been born without the effects of alcohol," Chavez said.

Russell Westerberg, a lobbyist for Hagadone Hospitality, which opposes the measure, said his client buys more than $600,000 in liquor annually from the state dispensary, but still wasn't invited to participate in the drafting of the bill.

"You'd think they'd at least ask for some input," Westerberg said. "We didn't get a peek at this bill" until after it was introduced.

Westerberg also raised the specter of "county roadhouses" springing up just outside eastern Idaho's Rexburg, which has forbidden cocktail sales, to entice students from Mormon-run Brigham Young University-Idaho. Alcohol consumption is against the religion's tenets, but some college kids might be lured to imbibe anyway, he said.

Some bar owners lambasted the new license scheme during two days of hearings, saying it could undermine the value of existing licenses that in some instances have sold on a secondary market for more than $100,000. That argument resonated with Rep. Janice McGeachin, R-Idaho Falls, who said existing license holders could face economic ruin.

"I cannot cast a vote today that will take somebody's livelihood away from them," she said.

Otter's staff lawyer, David Hensley, contends the bill will end liquor license speculation — some speculators have their names on the current waiting list in dozens of Idaho cities — without amounting to an illegal taking, because the state doesn't consider liquor licenses private property.

Foes said lawsuits are inevitable.

"It would be worth a lawsuit to find out who is right or wrong," said Larry Jenkins, owner of the Gem Club in Emmett, Idaho.

Ken Burgess, the Idaho Licensed Beverage Association lobbyist who helped draft the bill, said his group did its best to preserve existing licenses' value. For instance, they'd be transferable anywhere in Idaho; new municipal licenses must stay put. What's more, state license holders alone would get a 10 percent discount from the state's liquor monopoly. And their yearly renewal fees would run about $1,500, half the cost of renewing the new municipal licenses.

Burgess conceded initial years after reforms "might be a little bumpy" for holders of existing licenses who opt to sell to somebody else, as the free market sorts out their value under the new rules.

Still, "they're not being obliterated, they're not being taken away," Burgess said. "Nobody will lose their ability to do business."


Copyright 2009 The Associated Press.



Eye On Boise

News, happenings and more from the Idaho Legislature and the state capital.