COLUMBIA - Two new bills were filed last week that add to the discussion about free-pour enabling legislation that is to continue Wednesday.

The argument may appear to be merely a business issue, but consumers should pay attention, said Tom Sponseller, president of the S.C. Hospitality Association.

"This whole distribution thing could affect the price consumers pay, and they ought to be voicing their opinion," Sponseller said.

Both proposals allow the major distributors who are licensed to buy liquor from distillers and bring it into the state to sell directly to bars.

The S.C. Hospitality Association supports opening up the market to both the major distributors and the liquor stores that are licensed to sell minibottles to bars.

The 58 current minibottle licensees say they will be undercut by the wholesalers and driven out of business, and others say the competition will be good for consumers.

One of the new bills, by Sen. Jim Ritchie, R-Spartanburg, allows the big distributors and the specially-licensed retail stores both to sell to bars with few restrictions. Ritchie's bill has been added to the agenda for the subcommittee hearings on the legislation at 9 a.m. Wednesday in Room 105 of the Gressette Senate Office Building.

The other bill was filed by Rep. Bill Cotty, R-Columbia, and includes some provisions to help the retail stores. Those would continue to be the exclusive sellers of minibottles in Cotty's plan.

However it shakes out, it now appears that it will not be possible to pass something and get it into effect before the summer tourist season. The industry now is shooting for September to be able to switch to free-pour for the fall golf season and the holidays, Sponseller said.

Milk support | Rep. Billy Witherspoon, R-Conway, succeeded last week in getting a bill through the House, 66-47, that failed last year. It would provide a break-even price for dairy farmers.

Witherspoon says the bill is wrongly being called a milk price-setting measure.

"There's no correlation between the retail price of milk and the farm price," Witherspoon said.

He is chairman of the House Agriculture and Natural Resources Committee and says dairy farmers are quitting business in South Carolina at an alarming rate.

The loss will mean higher prices for consumers in South Carolina who will have to pay transportation costs for out-of-state milk, and the product will not be as fresh, Witherspoon said.

The break-even price will be paid by processors out of money they collect for shipping milk into the state, he said.

Debate on the measure was contentious and resulted in amendments for protection of prices for shrimp farmers and tomato farmers. The amendments were all voted down.

"I was called a capitalist and a communist on this last week," Witherspoon said. "I was called all kinds of names."

The bill has been sent to the Senate, which has a similar bill.

Coastal-permits bill | Coastal property owners could be affected by a bill introduced last week that would end the practice of taking into account adjacent property owners' land use and values when considering permit requests such as for docks. The bill was assigned to a committee for review.

Next week | The House will debate a bill making it more difficult for cities and counties to get rid of nonconforming billboards. The bill is on the agenda for Tuesday but could be bumped to Wednesday.