Hi there,
Well, I have
good news and bad news.
The good news is that
New Hampshire passed their cottage food bill, which removes the sales limit for cottage food businesses (known as "homestead food operations") in their state.
So that's great for them! Once that bill goes into effect in October, they will become
the 30th state to remove their sales limit entirely. In addition, DC doesn't have a sales limit, and FL and WY are virtually unlimited ($250k sales limits).
I've always felt like sales limits are pretty much pointless (for many reasons), so it's good to see states doing away with them!
Alright, now
time for the bad news.
As you might recall, at the
end of last year, Wisconsin won yet another lawsuit, which allowed producers to sell all non-perishable foods (not just baked goods).
Unfortunately, that is
no longer the case, at least for now.
Producers in Wisconsin once again have to stick to selling baked goods (or canned goods, via their pickle bill) while the court system figures everything out (which could take awhile).
How this all happened is a bit complex, but here's my best understanding of it (I'm trying to remove lingo here).
First, it's important to know that
the lawsuit was won in a county court. The
ag dept challenged the ruling at the county level, and the county eventually denied their challenge.
But
the ag dept also challenged at the state level, and the state decided that they weren't ready to make a decision yet. So
they chose to revert things to the way they were before the county court's ruling, until they could figure out their final decision on the case.
In other words...
it definitely ain't over yet!And you can be sure that the Institute for Justice and other supporters in Wisconsin are prepared to
fight to get their freedom back (they have already
petitioned the Supreme Court).
And so, the
saga continues in Wisconsin. You can't make this stuff up!
Until next week,
David