BILL ANALYSIS Ó SB 819 Page 1 Date of Hearing: August 3, 2016 ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS Lorena Gonzalez, Chair SB 819 (Huff) - As Amended June 28, 2016 ----------------------------------------------------------------- |Policy |Governmental Organization |Vote:|15 - 0 | |Committee: | | | | | | | | | | | | | | ----------------------------------------------------------------- Urgency: No State Mandated Local Program: YesReimbursable: No SUMMARY: This bill prohibits the purchase, sale, offer for sale, distribution, manufacture, possession, or use of powdered alcohol. It requires the Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control (ABC) to revoke the license of any licensee who manufactures, distributes, or sells powdered alcohol. FISCAL EFFECT: Minor absorbable workload to ABC to monitor and enforce the SB 819 Page 2 provisions of this bill. COMMENTS: 1)Purpose. Proponents of SB 819 argue that powdered alcohol, a powder product that becomes an alcoholic beverage when mixed with water or any other liquid, is a dangerous product with potential great appeal to underage drinkers. It is cheap, potent, and easy to hide, and supporters point out that youth are especially vulnerable because they can sneak powdered alcohol products into events. 2)Federal and state regulation of powdered alcohol. While powdered alcohol is technically legal, it is not currently being sold anywhere in the United States. In 2015, the US Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TBB) approved labels for a product called Palcohol, and the Palcohol website states that "we will be working on getting production facility up and running. It will take a while but hopefully it will be available soon." Twenty-seven states have already banned powdered alcohol, and three states, Colorado, Delaware, and New Mexico, have added powdered alcohol in their statutory definitions of alcohol so that the product can be regulated under existing alcohol regulations. 3)Vaporized alcohol. Existing state law bans the sale or use of any vaporized form of alcohol produced by an alcohol vaporizing device. Vaporized alcohol is alcohol mixed with pure oxygen or another gas to produce a vaporized product that can be inhaled. To date, no notable enforcement cost can be SB 819 Page 3 attributed to the ban of this type of alcohol. 4)Related legislation and recent amendments. An earlier version of AB 1554 (Irwin) of 2016, which is pending in the Senate Appropriations Committee, was nearly identical to this bill. Recent amendments to both AB 1554 and SB 819 made the two bills complementary rather than competing pieces of legislation. Specifically, the duties of ABC related to the licensure of manufacturers, distributors, and sellers of powdered alcohol and the fines established for purchases of powdered alcohol and sellers of powdered alcohol were divided between the two bills. Analysis Prepared by:Luke Reidenbach / APPR. / (916) 319-2081