2024 Regular Session - Day 42 - HB 439, Rep. Matthew Koch

thank you Mr Speaker let's start with a little technical work to get the bill to where it needs to be like to please have the clerk call house committee sub two move adoption please report house committee substitute two to House Bill 439 gentl bourbon move adoption motion is for the adoption of house committee substitute two is there any discussion of the committee substitute lady from fet do you wish to discuss the committee sub or the bill motions for the adoption of house committee substitute two is there any discussion those in favor signify by voting I those oppose nay house committee substitute two is adopted gentleman from bbon Mr Speaker please have the clerk report house floor Amendment two clerk please report house floor Amendment two to House Bill 439 gentleman from bourbon move adoption motion is the adoption of house floor amendment to is there any discussion of the floor Amendment seeing none those in favor signify a voting I those posos nay house floor Amendment two is adopted gentleman from bourbon thank you Mr Speaker I know everyone has their favorite part of this large alcohol bill so let me go through each of the sections uh first off we start off with the definition under Riverboat we go from 100 passengers down to 40 passengers this allows for the expansion of Tourism right here in the Kentucky River uh so you can actually have a bourbon while you're on the bourbon Cruise it's the nation's only boat-based bourbon tour uh then we move on to page 18 section 7 this will allow for a local option election to be held for alcohol sales in a city or County Precinct whereing Marina is located in that uh Precinct and it has to meet these Provisions it has to have at least 15 boat slips it has to buy and sell gasoline for the operation of boats and it has to sell staple groceries and operate a restaurant um part three of this bill is a vintage Spirits bill I think we'll all remember that from a few years ago if you were uphill if you were up here it had a lot of different names the uh I think a lot of people refer to it as the dusty bottle Bill what happened when we created the Vintage Spirit bill is that we inadvertently created an unregulated fourth tier we're all we're all familiar with our three- tier alcohol system we inadvertently created an unregulated fourth tier system so what we've done is we've created a license and a from the ABC we've created created a license that you can purchase for $300 um and that'll allow the ABC to identify who is actually doing this so that they can control this it's it's a large part of quality that goes along with this um we're not trying to limit what bottle is or not allowed to be sold whether we're trying to control the quality the quantity of that um as long as the bottle is not available from a licensed tow sailor in the Commonwealth the licensees shall then file a monthly report with the Department um with required information that's not listed out on page 26 of the bill and the biggest restriction is that no more than 24 packages no more than 24 bottles in a 12-month period if they do and this is the amendment that we passed we have taken we have taken the Criminal part out and we have put in monetary fins I know that was a concern to many of our members so that's what we've done it's $500 on the First Defense $2500 on the second fence and for every subsequent after that it is a $5,000 fine if the department seizes alcoholic beverages they must provide the lensey a notice of the violation in 14 days that's fair enough there's several investigations going on right there right now it took a long time for the apartment to get back with these companies with these retailers their products been on a shelf that' been held in limbo 14 days I I believe that is fair process to let them know exactly why that is uh being held and why it was taken failure to do so returns that property back to the owner only after a final order and after all appeals May that alcohol be destroyed or if it meets all the requirements that are listed out in here such as being an unopened steel sealed package uh it can be sold at auction for the alcohol wellness and responsibility education that we have renamed aware in this uh in this bill it's formerly known as the malt beverage education we're actually expanding that program so if these bottles are sold at auction all that money will go into it it allows um this is to deter and stop underage drinking binge drinking John campus uh project grad project prom it puts money across the state and it puts uh a member of KDA on that board as well expans that board to make sure that that money is distributed into those programs I'm now going to yield to the gentleman from fayet 45 to discuss to discuss the quota portion