Gov. Robert Bentley signed Pike County’s draft beer legislation into law this week, but don’t pull out the chilled beer mugs yet.
Each local municipality must draft and pass an ordinance allowing local businesses to start draft beer service.
Brundidge Mayor Jimmy Ramage said the earliest the council there could start the process was April 15. The resolution would have to go through a first and second reading before councilmen could pass it.
“We just met April 1 … and we didn’t have the right to do the ordinance until it had been passed into law,” Ramage said.
Ramage isn’t sure the new law will have any impact on Brundidge commerce.
He does not expect it would attract more businesses to the town and Brundidge business owners have not contacted him, urging him to get an ordinance passed.
Ramage said he could see where draft beer service would benefit restaurants and had no issues with passing it into law.
“We’ve got time,” he said.
Troy City Councilman Marcus Paramore said Troy also would have to draft a resolution and go through two readings before passing it.
“The earliest we could introduce a resolution is at Tuesday’s meeting,” he said.
Paramore did not know whether a draft would be ready in time for Tuesday. If one is, draft beer service could be passed into law at the April 22 meeting, which would be in time for TroyFest. The downtown festival starts April 26.
The bill was introduced after downtown business owners Jamie and Lyndsay Taylor broached the subject with city council last February.
“It was something the community wanted and we were glad we were able to get that accomplished,” Paramore said.