State Alcohol Board Starts First Rules Review in 20 Years

By Amanda Iacone, Virginia Statehouse News Thursday, September 08, 2011

RICHMOND - To find out if a bar is holding a football kickoff party or if a corner grocery carries a particular Virginia wine, customers have to walk into that bar or store and ask.

Regulations make it illegal for retailers and restaurants to post signs in the window or even advertise specials on their websites.

Restaurant and winery owners say these alcohol regulations are cumbersome and archaic. And the state agency charged with enforcing these rules is giving them a chance to weigh in on how to modernize them.

For the first time in 20 years, the Virginia Alcohol Beverage Control Board, or ABC, will review and update all of its regulations, removing many that are antiquated.

“If the agency can continue to reach its goal of public safety and control through more efficient and better means of regulation, that’s really what we want to see happen,” said ABC Chairman Neal Insley, who is a lawyer and a former ABC special agent.

Tom Lisk, a lawyer with the Eckert Seamans law firm in Richmond that lobbies for the Virginia Hospitality and Travel Association that represents restaurants and hotels in Virginia, said the entire collection of ABC regulations includes eight chapters and dozens of separate sections, including how to seek a license and how to handle cider.

“I think that’s pretty ambitious,” Lisk said.

Restaurants, which in Virginia usually double as bars, also want rules clarified on the use of social media like Twitter and Facebook, particularly for advertising happy hour and other weekly specials.

The ABC said restaurants can’t post such information on the web or email it to customers, but they can send this information in the U.S. Postal Service.

Lisk describes this disparity in the rules as “bizarre.”

Advertising rules regulate what beer banners or signs can hang inside a restaurant. But another chapter of the rules dictates how restaurants can obtain such signage, he said.

Signage is a concern to Virginia’s many wineries too. Local stores that carry Virginia wines can’t post signs in their storefronts advertising those wines, said Ann Heidig, founder of Lake Anna Winery and president of the Virginia Wineries Association, a trade organization that seeks to expand the market for Virginia-produced wines.

But the main concern for winery owners is reducing onerous requirements, like monthly shipping forms. Even if wineries ship no cases or bottles within Virginia, they are required to fill out a form with “nothing to report” and mail it to the state, Heidig said.

Heidig also questions whether the state needs the name and address of her customers.

Other regulations need to be clarified, including who is allowed to pour the wine during wine tastings, she said.

“Some of the rules are really difficult and archaic,” she said.

The review seeks to accomplish the governor’s goal for state agencies to be business friendly and operate more efficiently, Insley said. However, the review is not connected with the governor’s effort to privatize the state-run ABC stores, which sell hard liquor, and will not affect those retail stores.

A group of stakeholders, representing wholesalers and restaurants plus the wine, beer and spirits industries, will draft proposed changes that the ABC will consider as it begins drafting new regulations, a process that can often take two years.

The stakeholders group is expected to meet in October and finalize their recommendations by November.