Governor Signs Law on Beer Labeling

Beginning next year, Californians can quaff more potent fancy malt beverages but call them just plain beer.

Gov. Pete Wilson signed a bill Thursday that allows any malt beverage, regardless of alcohol content, to be called beer, as long as the alcohol content is listed on the label if it is more than 5.7%.

The governor also signed bills relating to historic documents for high school students, swimming pool and window-bar safety and sex offenders and graffiti vandals.

Under current law, any malt beverage with more than 5% alcohol cannot be called beer, but must be called ale, porter, stout or malt liquor.

A pale bock created by the Sierra Nevada brewery of Chico won best of show at the State Fair’s recent beer contest, but cannot be sold as beer because it has 6.7% alcohol, noted the bill’s author, Sen. Mike Thompson, (D-St. Helena).

“This is a very simple effort to allow beer to be called beer and to permit consumers the convenience to enjoy their favorite microbrew at their neighborhood cafe, club or pizza parlor,” Thompson said.

Wilson vetoed an earlier version of the bill last summer, but Thompson added the requirement that any beer with more than 5.7% alcohol list the content on the label.

Opponents in the Legislature said the bill was an attempt by beer companies to expand the market for stronger drinks. Others said it could let underage drinkers try stronger brews more easily.

Also signed was a bill by Assemblyman Keith Olberg (R-Victorville) that requires students to read historic documents such as the U.S. Constitution, Declaration of Independence and the Federalist Papers before graduating from high school.

The safety bills relate to child-safety features for new swimming pools and spas and emergency release latches on iron window bars.

The pool bill by Assemblyman Brian Setencich (R-Fresno) affects residential pools built after Jan. 1, 1998. It requires that they have one of five features: child resistant fence, pool cover, exit alarms, self-closing doors or other devices as yet undeveloped.

The bar bill by Assemblyman Tom Bates (D-Berkeley) was introduced because of a fire last year that killed five Oakland children who died in a bedroom with iron window bars that were bolted shut.

The bill allows local governments to require emergency release levers in older buildings. Current law requires the release devices in buildings constructed after 1991.

The crime bills signed include ones that require paroled sex offenders to register with police within five working days of release, instead of 14; allow schools to suspend or expel students who commit sexual battery or assault at school, and require people convicted of sex or violent crimes to provide blood and saliva specimens and palm and thumbprints for crime-solving purposes.

Another new law requires, instead of allows, courts to suspend or delay the driver’s licenses of teenagers convicted of graffiti vandalism.