FuzzyBrew

A bill that would raise the alcohol-by-weight limit in beer from 5% to 8% is headed to the desk of Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant.

Senate Bill 2878, which passed the state Senate on March 12, was approved by the House on Tuesday with no debate.

The bill has been pushed by grassroots group Raise Your Pints as well as Anheuser-Busch and its independent distributors in Mississippi.

It now awaits the signature of Gov. Bryant, who said in January he isn’t “necessarily opposed” to signing the legislation, the Mississippi Business Journal reported.

Bryant spokesman Mick Bullock just emailed a short statement. It said, “Gov. Bryant will review the measure after it has been transmitted to him by the Legislature.” [source]

The timing of its passage Tuesday took the Raise Your Pints folks by surprise.

Well, we were not expecting it to happen this quick, but…..

— Raise Your Pints (@RaiseYourPints) March 27, 2012

#CraftBeer bill SB 2878 has PASSED the House!!! Next stop the Governor’s desk! hops.me/jtm #msleg

— Raise Your Pints (@RaiseYourPints) March 27, 2012

Mississippi is the only state that limits ABW for beer to just 5 percent, which in turns prohibits sales of about a third of the world’s beer styles. Raise Your Pints is also seeking to make homebrewing legal in the state, though homebrewing bills have not advanced in the legislature this session.

We’ll keep you updated on any more developments.

Add Turtle Anarchy Brewing Company to the growing list of breweries coming soon to the Nashville area.

Turtle Anarchy, which was spotlighted Monday in a story by The Tennessean, is opening later this year in Williamson County, just outside of Nashville.

Mark Kamp, president of the new microbrewery, told the paper he sees a revolution slowly taking hold in the craft beer industry in Nashville and across the United States.

By the end of May, Kamp hopes to be filling glasses and contributing to that revolution as the owner of Turtle Anarchy Brewing Co. Kamp, a 2010 graduate of Belmont University, is opening Williamson County’s first microbrewery. Kamp joins an emerging craft beer scene that is just beginning to build momentum in the Nashville area but since the 1990s has exploded elsewhere across the U.S.” [source]

Turtle Anarchy will be the second brewery in Williamson County, joining brewpub Cool Springs Brewery. Mike Kraft is leaving Cool Springs Brewery to serve as brewmaster for Turtle Anarchy, according to The Tennessean.

Kamp, meanwhile, has been keeping a blog since February, providing updates and posting photos to document progress.

We leased a space at 216 Noah Drive where we will be producing craft brewed ales on a 15 bbl system. We are a 100% family owned business and we are excited to begin brewing beer for the very deserving people of Tennessee,” Kamp wrote. [source]

Other breweries in development in Nashville include Broadcast Brewing Company, Fat Bottom Brewing and Black Abbey Brewing Company.

Update: PolitiFact Tennessee took down this post over the weekend, and have since updated and reposted its ruling.

Last week, PolitiFact Tennessee tackled a claim by the Tax Foundation that Tennessee has some of the lowest beer excise taxes in the nation — a claim subsequently spread by other media outlets. Yazoo‘s brewmaster took umbrage to that claim:

@nashvillebiz do your homework! TN has 17% wholesale tax on top of excise tax, giving us the highest beer taxes in the country! @yazoobrew

— Linus Hall (@yazoobrewmaster) March 12, 2012

From PolitiFact:

We found inconsistencies in the Tax Foundation’s map. A footnote says, “Local rates are excluded unless they are statewide and uniform. Alabama and Georgia include statewide local rates.” But we found that standard was not applied to Tennessee, which has a 17-percent wholesale tax on beer that is statewide, uniform and mandatory. Including the revenue it produces would push the state to No. 1 on the Tax Foundation’s rankings, just as it is ranked by the Beer Institute.

Check out the rest of PolitiFact Tennessee’s analysis — it’s pretty interesting, and does a good job of breaking down the various convoluted ways alcohol is taxed in this state.

Craft beer lovers in Mississippi took one step closer to higher-alcohol beer Monday with passage of Senate Bill 2878, which would raise the alcohol-by-weight limit from 5% to 8% in beer.

The bill, which has been pushed by grassroots group Raise Your Pints as well as Anheuser-Busch and its independent distributors in Mississippi, passed the Senate by a 38-14 margin. The state’s House of Representatives passed its own version of the ABW bill on March 1.

The next step, according to the Mississippi Business Journal, is “for whatever differences the two chambers have over the legislation to be ironed out in conference committee.”

This is big news for Raise Your Pints and other supporters of the craft beer movement. The bills in each chamber have received enough bipartisan support that there’s not much of a chance either of the bills will die in conference. Like Rep. Hank Zuber did in the House, Sen. John Horhn, D-Jackson, made the bill about tourism and economic development, not alcohol, when he presented it to the Senate. [source]

Horhn told the Associated Press that about 6,000 Mississippians who are gourmet beer consumers will benefit from the legislation.

Those who consider themselves connoisseurs are passionate about their beer, so much so that they drive outside the state to acquire beer.” That means lost tax revenue for the state and an unclear idea of how much beer is being consumed, Horhn said. He added the bill would only affect an estimated 16 brands of beer in the short term because the state’s laws only allow beer to be sold by select distributors. [source]

Mississippi is the only state that limits ABW for beer to just 5 percent, which in turns prohibits sales of about a third of the world’s beer styles. Raise Your Pints is also seeking to make homebrewing legal in the state, though homebrewing bills have not advanced in the legislature this session.

We’ll keep you updated on any more developments.