INDIANAPOLIS – A legislative push to allow wider Sunday alcohol sales gained momentum Wednesday while an effort to expand the sale of cold beer likely suffered a death blow.

The push for Sunday carryout sales — approved Wednesday by a House committee 12 to 1 and passed unanimously last week by a Senate panel — seems on a fast track to passage.

But a bill to allow grocery and convenience stores to sell cold beer was defeated in a Senate committee Wednesday by a 9-to-1 vote, likely signaling its death for this session.

The starkly divergent paths for the bills is neatly following the path key lawmakers predicted months ago but also closely reflects the outline of the deal struck in the fall between the powerful liquor store lobby and big box stores — a deal to support Sunday sales but to oppose cold beer’s expansion.

“The coalitions were built and no one seems to be running away from the coalitions,” said Andy Downs, director of the Fort Wayne-based Mike Downs Center for Indiana Politics.

Source: Indy Star