City Attorney Christina Montgomery addressed the Emporia City Commission Wednesday about changes to state cereal malt beverage laws.
In April, grocery stores, convenience stores and CMB bars that only serve low-alcohol-volume beer may be allowed to carry enhanced cereal malt beverages.
An enhanced cereal malt beverage, according to Commissioner Becky Smith, who owns Twin Rivers Winery and Gourmet Shoppe, is essentially a strong beer — up to but no more than 6 percent alcohol; IPAs may fall into this category.
She said the changes to enhanced cereal malt beverage laws won’t have any impact on her business because it’s a farm winery and she doesn’t produce such products.
However, Smith does have an opinion on the change to the laws.
“I think it’s great,” she said. “I think the city and the state are finally coming into the 20 and 21st century. Most alcoholic beverages are no longer 3.2 (percent), so it was harder for everybody.”
She feels the change will even things up and open the field to more people.
City code may need to be tweaked, according to Montgomery, to reflect this change in state law.
(Read more: Emporia Gazette)