Legal Reforms for Beer Makers on Hold in Lansing

The widespread regional love for popup beer manufacturers like this weekend's Tashmoo Biergarten or permanent beer bases like the soon-to-come Atwater Brewery and Biergarten in Grosse Pointe Park must not filter all the way up to the state capital in Lansing.

That's at least the impression you get from reading a MLive story narrating the unprecedented union of small state microbreweries and large scale beer wholesalers in a coordinated push for a series of new beer regulations, including increased barrel thresholds (more beer produced per location) and changing the number of on-premise drinking locations per individual license.

MLive's Melissa Anders includes some great takes from folks like Larry Bell of Bell's Brewing, who honestly expects the collection of beer-related bills to make it to hearings in the legislature this fall.

But there are still some divides between breweries and beer-sellers of different sizes (not to mention nano-breweries like Corktown's still-under-construction Batch Brewing Company).

If legislators and breweries need a reminder of just how much people love beer (and would love it more if the state eased restrictions on movement, sale and production of the state's thriving breweries), look at the Facebook page for the Tashmoo Biergarten. Their presence at the Downtown Detroit Days festival was, by all accounts, a rip-roaring success, and all the local love for the folks behind the popup shows just how much people love them some beer.
· Microbrewers & Beer Wholesalers Agree on Easing Beer Regulations [MLive]