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Committee advances bill giving ATC short suspension power, shortens hearing deadline to 3 business days
Summary
The House Public Policy Committee voted to pass Senate Bill 5 as amended, giving the Alcohol and Tobacco Commission authority to impose short suspensions on alcoholic beverage retail permits when specified offenses occur on licensed premises and requiring a hearing within three business days; sponsors framed it as a public-safety tool and the amendment was adopted by consent.
Chair Representative Ethan Manning opened the committee hearing and introduced Senate Bill 5, presented by Senator Alting, saying the bill would give the Alcohol and Tobacco Commission (ATC) a mechanism to immediately suspend an alcoholic beverage retail permit when certain offenses occur repeatedly on the premises.
"What this bill basically does is a public safety bill that gives the ATC the authority to suspend an alcoholic beverage retail permit up to 5 days," Senator Alting said in his opening remarks, and the committee later agreed to shorten that time frame to require a hearing within three business days.
Representative Steve Bartels asked whether the measure would allow a suspension based on charges rather than convictions. Alex Fargo of the ATC responded that the intent is not to target only convicted owners but to address crimes committed on the premises: "It targets a crime that's been conducted on the property of the location," Fargo said, describing a scenario in which a serious violent crime on the premises could trigger a short suspension while the ATC follows up with a hearing.
Chair Manning described Amendment 2 as raising the procedural bar and making several rule-based conditions part of statute while moving the post-suspension hearing deadline to three business days to provide more prompt process. The committee adopted Amendment 2 by consent.
After no outside witnesses signed up to testify, a motion to pass SB5 as amended was made and seconded. The committee called the roll and left the vote open briefly; the clerk later recorded the final tally as 9–0 in favor and announced that Senate Bill 5 had passed the committee.
The measure now moves to the full House for second reading and further consideration. The committee did not adopt language clarifying the exact criminal standard (charges vs. convictions) in committee beyond the amendment; committee members indicated they would continue to refine language before subsequent readings.
