Hearing set on expanding take-out beer, wine for restaurants in Pennsylvania

Diners wanting to buy more beer and wine to-go from a restaurant could do so if a bill to revise the restaurant liquor license rules becomes law.

Representatives from the state Liquor Control Board, the Pennsylvania Restaurant and Lodging Association, and Wendell Young, president of the United Food and Commercial Workers Union, testified Tuesday during a House Liquor Control committee hearing at the Addison Fire Hall in Somerset County.

Even though the state has permitted supermarkets and convenience stores to sell beer and wine, many of the requirements placed on holders of a restaurant license still limit a patron’s ability to buy wine and beer, state Rep. Matthew Dowling, R-Uniontown, said in a statement on the Customer Convenience Permit bill. Dowling, the sponsor of HB 1644, could not be reached for comment.

Existing state law prohibits those with restaurant liquor licenses to sell more than 192 ounces of beer — an amount equal to 16 12-ounce bottles — or more than 3,000 milliliters of wine — four bottles — for take-out purposes.

Dowling’s bill would lift the requirement that establishments with a restaurant license have space for at least 30 seats.

The Pennsylvania Restaurant and Lodging Association opposes the bill in its current form. Restaurants should not have to pay $25,000 for a license to sell that amount of take-out alcohol, said Melissa Bova, vice president of government affairs for the association.

“That portion of the bill should go away. We are in favor of splitting it into two different bills,” Bova said.

The bill proposes the customer convenience permit to expand operating privileges would have to be renewed every year.

There is not a companion bill in the state Senate, Bova said.