‘Bake sale bill’ killed in committee late in term
By Katie Roenigk
Staff Writer

A bill that was intended to exempt food at community events from stringent state statutes and Department of Agriculture regulations died in Senate committee as the Wyoming Legislature commission wound down.
House Bill 54, the Wyoming Food Freedom Act, was created to address problems experienced this past winter at area bake sales and craft bazaars, when a local inspector reportedly announced all goods for sale had to be accompanied by a list of ingredients and cooked in a regulation kitchen, among other requirements.
The regulations also could have affected food brought to funerals, weddings and farmers markets.
The Food Freedom Act had passed the house 43-14 on Feb. 23. If it had passed the Senate, it would have exempted certain food sales from licensure, certification and inspection.
“Any producer or processor who is selling his product only at farmers’ markets, roadside stands or by ranch-, farm- and home-based sales directly to the end consumer is exempt from licensing,” the bill read.
It also exempted direct sales made at traditional community social events.

Failed to pass
Local legislators said the bill did not pass because it came to include stipulations about other subjects.
“The bill grew and was exempting raw milk, beef and so on,” Rep. Del McOmie, R-Lander, said. “That should require some oversight.”
McOmie was one of several local sponsors of the bill, including Rep. Dave Miller, R-Riverton, and Sen. Eli Bebout, R-Riverton.
Bebout said he was a member of the Senate Agriculture Committee that eventually killed the bill, and he said that action was appropriate because of the unintended changes that had been incorporated.
“When we tried to amend the bill, it became more problematic,” Bebout said.
“Some of the provisions would have forced a lot of meat packing and processing plants potentially to shut down and other issues never intended, by my perspective.”
He said an interim committee would study the issue and work to develop a bill that deals only with community gatherings.

Original intention
Miller said he would sponsor another bazaar-friendly bill during the next legislative session if it comes up for consideration again.
“I wanted the bill to ... clarify once and for all that traditional social events could go on without the Department of Agriculture coming in to do things they don’t need to do,” Bebout said. “It’s called common sense, and they shouldn’t be there.”
A local inspector this winter reportedly had said she would shut down various bazaars, the big sale at the United Methodist Church, for example, if organizers did not follow regulations.
Miller said community members who were upset about such actions spoke to him during a “meet your legislator” day, which prompted him to get involved.
“In the future we will be watching this department very carefully, because they frankly were out of bounds in what they did last fall and over regulating bake sales,” Miller said. “We, as legislators that sponsored the bill, weren’t happy about it.”
He added that it is a priority to protect the public from any food-borne illnesses, but he said sickness from food eaten at community events has not been a problem in the state.
“I don’t know of any outbreaks in our county of people at these bake sales causing any trouble,” he said.
“It was the heavy hand of government interfering with tradition in our community.”

Next year
Though House Bill 54 did not pass, Bebout said the same problems should not occur next bake sale season, as the Department of Agriculture has agreed to work with legislators on regulations before then.
“We shouldn’t have any issues coming up for our community about that from the Department of Agriculture,” Bebout said. “If there are, I need to know immediately.”
The other sections regarding the sale of raw milk, for example, that caused contention this year may be part of a separate bill next year, he added.