Petition still alive, legislative help sought

Published: January 4, 2008

A proposed petition drive to allow Oklahoma wineries to sell their products to grocery stores is still alive, a consultant said Friday.

Meanwhile, several bills to help winemakers recover from a legal setback have been introduced for the 2008 legislative session, which begins next month.

Larry Wood, who is working on the grocery store proposal for Oklahomans for Modern Laws, said fundraising efforts for a petition drive would be stepped up, now that the holiday period has ended.

"We have various groups out raising money for us," Wood said. He said the group wants to raise $400,000 for a petition drive. He said he knows of one pledge of $75,000 and one potential contributor has offered to "top off" the fundraising effort once a majority of the money is raised.

Wood had announced the petition drive would begin late last year, but said it was delayed until enough money could be raised to hire a professional signature-gathering firm.

Gary Butler, president of the Oklahoma Grape Growers and Wine Makers Association, said he is optimistic lawmakers will pass two bills — one to permit direct sales on a limited basis to the homes of wine lovers and one to allow restricted sales to restaurants and liquor stores.

Butler said his association has "kind of taken a neutral position" on the proposed initiative petition, which would permit wine to be sold in grocery stores.

"It is something some members support very strongly," Butler said. "Almost an equal number would like to stay neutral on it because they have built a good relationship with liquor stores."

Wood said a majority of wineries support the proposal.

"A couple of the big ones don't because they don't want competition," Wood said.

The number of wineries in Oklahoma grew from a handful to more than 30 after a state question was adopted several years ago in a statewide vote to permit winemakers to sell to liquor stores and restaurants.

In 2006, however, a federal judge ruled the law unconstitutional because it discriminated against out-of-state wineries.

The ruling went into effect last July, leaving some Oklahoma winemakers with nowhere to sell their products except at special events like county and state fairs, unless they went through a wholesaler.

Butler said a bill to allow winemakers to "self distribute" their products to liquor stores and restaurants would give small wineries a chance to grow.

The proposal, by Rep. Don Armes, R-Faxon, would limit such sales by individual wineries to 10,000 gallons of wine a year. It seeks to meet constitutional guidelines by allowing out-of-state wineries to do the same.

Armes said as a practical matter, big out-of-state wineries would continue to market their products from wholesale to retail because they sell much more than 10,000 gallons of wine each year in Oklahoma

Bills to allow direct shipments of wine to Oklahoma homes have been introduced by Reps. Jeff Hickman, R-Dacoma, and Al McAffrey, D-Oklahoma City.

Butler said those measures, which limit the amount of wine an individual could purchase, would "open the door to thousands of wine labels that are not available to Oklahomans today unless they go to a winery in another state."

Armes said he has involved wholesalers in discussions on his bill in hopes they go will go along.

"Basically, the wholesalers are going to have to bless whatever the Oklahoma wine industry wants to do or it will never pass," Armes said.

Sen. Harry Coates, R-Seminole, pushed legislation to provide new markets for state winemakers through the Senate last year, only to see it die in the House. He blamed the defeat on "powerful wholesale liquor interests."

Coates said he did not offer similar legislation this year, but would be willing to sign on to bills that get out of the House.

James McSpadden has been retained by the wineries to lobby for their legislation.

"We will be tweaking the language in those two bills quite a bit because we are having ongoing negotiations with wholesalers," McSpadden said. "They've been willing to sit down at the table with us, which we appreciate."

Both Armes and McSpadden said it is unlikely any legislation would pass to allow grocery store sales of wine.

"If it does come up as a state question, it would have to be done as a petition," McSpadden said.

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