3/2/2010
Long Island Press, NY
Hundreds of farmers from across New York and Long Island converged on the State Capitol on Monday urging legislators to back off on a series of measures that aim to drive more family farms out of business, killing local agriculture...
Farmers are asking for a defeat of the Farmworker Omnibus Labor bill, restoration of agriculture promotion in the state budget, roll backs on expensive fees and taxes from last year’s budget, and passage of the wine in grocery store bill to grow the wine industry and create n
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3/2/2010
Newswise, NY
Through the support and efforts of New York State Senator Ken LaValle, Stony Brook University (SBU) will receive a $3.5 million state grant from the New York State Economic Development Assistance Program (NYS EDAP) for the construction of an approximate 8,500 square foot Agriculture Consumer Science Center at SBU’s Calverton Business Incubator. SBU established the Calverton Business Incubator in 2005 with a focus on the development of aquaculture, agriculture and environmental technologies. The Agriculture
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3/2/2010
amNY, NY
These days, it’s easy to prepare a meal bursting with fresh regionally grown ingredients.
But when it comes to finding sophisticated local quaffs, staying in the neighborhood gets trickier. Sure, Six Points and Brooklyn breweries always have gorgeous beer on tap, but sometimes a special meal calls for more than suds.
If a few renegade winemakers have their way, locavores will be trading tips about the merits of Gotham varietals and indulging in luxurious homegrown tipples...
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3/1/2010
NYU Local, NY
After a Health Department deputy commissioner said last week that state was considering new taxes on alcohol, Mayor Bloomberg replied that he wouldn’t rule out implementing the idea soon, according to the NYDN. “Never say never [but] we do not plan to have that in our budget that we’re working on right now,” Bloomberg said.
One of the plans offered by the DOH would increase the tax on beer to 17 cents, or as the Daily News put it, “a bottle of Bud would skyrocket as much as 10 cents — taking the fun out
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3/1/2010
Oneida Dispatch, NY
Wineries from Long Island to Western New York, and from the Hudson Valley to the Thousand Islands, have joined the fight to defeat Governor Paterson’s plan to legalize the sale of wine in every grocery store, deli, mini-mart, gas station, and bodega in New York.
“This plan will only hurt our businesses and hurt our partners in the wine and liquor stores,” said William Ouweleen of Eagle Crest Vineyards in the Finger Lakes. “Big box stores will stock the most popular, lowest-priced brands on their shelves,
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3/1/2010
Albany Times Union, NY
The battle over whether wine should be sold in grocery stores is an old one and it’s been hard fought, but this could be a breakthrough due to the sheer political muscle wielded by the teachers unions and their allies. They’ve lined up on the side of the wine-in-grocery-store proponents due to the revenue they believe such a move could generate.
There’s potentially an interesting question here, though, which relates to the broadened availability of wine, which is a concern raised by those who opposed the
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3/1/2010
Legislative Gazette, NY
A bill aimed at promoting New York wines by amending the state's alcoholic beverage control law to allow wineries to sell their products for consumption at food festivals passed in the Senate Feb. 22.
The bill (S.5440-b/ A.8172-b), sponsored by Sen. David Valesky, D-Oneida, and Assembly Agriculture Committee Chairman William Magee, D-Nelson, would allow licensed wineries and farm wineries to sell wine in glasses of eight ounces or smaller at food festivals in the state...
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3/1/2010
Legislative Gazette, NY
The governor's proposal to allow the sale of wine in grocery stores is supported by New York voters by a margin of 58 to 39 percent, according to the results of a Siena Research Institute poll released last week.
The contentious plan to permit wine sales in grocery stores, which is included in Gov. David A. Paterson's 2010-2011 Executive Budget, was proposed to increase state revenues through taxes and a new franchise fee for grocery stores that want to sell wine...
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2/27/2010
Poughkeepsie Journal, NY
The Town of New Paltz and the owners of Rivendell Winery, Susan Wine and Robert Ransom, are engaged in a legal battle over whether a winery is considered an agricultural use.
Wine has filed an appeal with the Appellate Division of the state Supreme Court in Albany against the Town of New Paltz Zoning Board of Appeals and former Town of New Paltz Building Inspector Thomas Wiacek.
Wine is appealing the town's 2007 ruling that a winery is not agricultural in nature. The ruling prevented Wine and her husband,
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2/26/2010
The Post-Standard - Syracuse.com, NY
The last year was a challenge for the state’s dairy farmers.
But things are looking up. The price they are paid for their milk is on the rise from the low of about $11.50 a hundredweight — or 99 cents per gallon — in early 2009.
In December 2009, the average milk price paid to farmers was up to $16.04 per hundredweight, or $1.38 a gallon.
Dairy is the biggest part of New York’s billion dollar agriculture industry and when dairy farmers hurt, nearly everyone else hurts.
Andrew Novakovic, a dairy
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2/26/2010
EmpireStateNews.net, NY
U.S. Senator Charles E. Schumer announced that the Treasury Department and the Department of Homeland Security have withdrawn the October 15, 2009 proposals by the Bureau of Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB) that would have significantly affected New York’s thriving wine industry. The CBP and TTB proposed changes would have repealed a program that currently provides a rebate for wineries that export NYS wine. Under the program, any federal tax or dut
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2/26/2010
MPNnow.com, NY
A CHEER ... to Don Bombace, whose business — Bombace Wine and Spirits in Farmington — was recently named 2010 Retailer of the Year by the New York Wine and Grape Foundation. The award recognizes a retailer who has shown loyalty to selling and promoting New York state wines, and Bombace has shown that loyalty, carrying more than 650 local wines.
“His store is a showcase for New York state wines, and we’d like to see more stores like his across the state,” said Jim Trezise, president of the foundation..
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2/26/2010
Wine Spectator, CA
In the past, the wet, cold, growing season of 2008 would have worried Larry Perrine, CEO of Channing Daughters winery. Northern Long Island is already a difficult place to grow wine grapes, and the cool, moist weather of that year seemed to assure that herbaceous, green bell pepper flavors would appear in (and for some, ruin) his red wines. Vintners can leave the grapes on the vine longer to develop more ripe fruit flavors, but they can end up with reduced crop size and weight (and reduced profit), plus the
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2/26/2010
Village Voice, NY
If you've been waiting to try the first Red Hook Winery bottlings, you're going to have to hop to it. Yesterday, while checking out Dry Dock, the new wine shop in Red Hook, we came up upon a small selection of the winery's rose, which is produced in Red Hook with grapes from Jamesport Vineyard on the North Fork of Long Island. There were six bottles left, and we bought one. After the remaining five bottles go, there won't be more until the 2009 vintage is bottled.
The rose is the only Red Hook wine Dry D
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2/26/2010
New York Times, NY
Finger Lakes Wine Country, a tourism company in upstate New York, has extended its Winter Wine Weekends package through April 30. Though temperatures may be freezing, visiting in the off-season also means lower prices and fewer crowds.
With the package, travelers who stay two nights get a third free, at 27 accommodations in the Finger Lakes region, which encompasses Seneca and Keuka Lake. The deal also includes a bottle of wine and a Palate Passport, which grants free admission to area museums and local
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2/26/2010
New York Times, NY
IT is 14 degrees above zero as a group of wine lovers converges in a vineyard on the Niagara Peninsula. Frosty bundles of Riesling grapes hang on rows of vines in the pale, gathering daylight. A storm the night before has left behind six inches of fresh snow...
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2/25/2010
Village Voice, NY
Assemblyman Felix Ortiz has been trying to further tax alcoholic beverages in the state to fund "alcoholism and substance abuse prevention and treatment." So far the assembly has bottled that one up, so to speak, in ways and means.
But now the City Department of Health is looking at a new booze tax*...
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2/25/2010
Brooklyn Daily Eagle, NY
It’s most certainly not a matter of “I’ll drink to that” when it comes to Governor David Paterson’s controversial proposal to permit the sale of wine in grocery stores, bodegas, delis, mini-marts and gas stations statewide: a total of 19,000 potential new wine sales outlets.
Opponents who formed the Last Store on Main Street Coalition want to dunk the plan. Members of the coalition see it as a way to kill small businesses and jobs, and increase the number of underage drinkers with no fiscal benefit to a
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2/25/2010
Wine Spectator, CA
Wine Spectator spoke with two prominent New York vintners on the controversial subject of grocery store wine sales. See Charles Massoud of Paumanok Vineyards' Q&A for the opposing point of view.
Scott Osborn, an upstate New York native and owner of Fox Run Vineyards since 1993, has long been recognized as a leader in perfecting and promoting Finger Lakes wines. He is an outspoken proponent of Gov. David Paterson’s initiative to allow the sale of wine in grocery stores in New York, which is one of only 15
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2/25/2010
Supermarket News
Members of the New York State Liquor Store Association and others opposed to New York Gov. David Patterson’s wine-at-grocery proposal urged the State Legislature to reject the plan here Wednesday, claiming it would force the closure of 1,000 small businesses and cost 4,500 jobs.
“They are the people who are the big losers if this goes into effect, while the big winners will be corporate grocery stores from out of state,” said Michael McKeon, spokesman for the Last Store on Main Street Coalition, a group
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