Another Round of Fees on Beer, Wine and Spirits Proposed at Colorado Legislature

A proposal to implement a series of fees on beer, wine and spirits manufactured and distributed in Colorado is back at the Colorado Legislature for another round. 

Dubbed the Behavioral Health Treatment and Recovery Enterprises Act, the bill seeks to collect 5 cents per gallon of beer or cider, 35 cents per liter of spirits, and 7 cents per liter of wine from Colorado manufacturers and distributors. The state would use the resulting revenue to fund a variety of programs for the prevention and treatment of alcoholism through Colorado’s Behavioral Health Administration.

If this sounds familiar, that’s because a similar measure introduced in the Colorado Senate died in committee two years ago after Governor Jared Polis proposed exempting all beer producers from the fee. 

Like the previous measure, the current bill does not call for a tax, which would require direct taxpayer approval under the Taxpayer Bill of Rights. Instead, it creates three Tabor-avoiding “enterprise fees” — fees collected from a specific industry to pay for services directly related to that industry. 

According to State Representative Jamie Jackson, who introduced the bill on February 19, the fees in this proposal are designed to offset the public health costs of alcohol-related disorders, and also make up for the state’s low excise tax on alcohol sales, which ranks 48 out of 50 in the country. 

“Our public systems are literally paying the cost for the harm caused by alcoholism,” she says. “So from our state and local governments to our health-care systems to our public safety systems, our court systems, our human services systems, we are literally paying the price to the tune of between $5 and $6 billion annually. It’s not unreasonable to ask that the alcohol industry pay to mitigate some of those harms.”

A much-cited stat from a 2024 Department of Public Health and Environment report lists Colorado as among the country’s highest states for alcohol consumption, with the seventh-highest rate of alcohol-related deaths. However, according to a 2025 analysis of data from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, alcohol use in this state is in decline. From 2013 to 2023, Colorado saw the seventh-biggest drop in adults who said they’d had a drink in the past thirty days.

Unsurprisingly, industry groups are united in their opposition to this new proposal. In a joint statement released by the Colorado Beverage Coalition, brewers, distillers and winemakers say the measure would amount to a 60 percent tax on their business at a time when sales are already declining and prices going up thanks to tariffs and other inflationary pressures. 

The math behind that figure: If beer is already taxed at 8 cents per gallon, adding another 5 cents per gallon increases the cost for state manufacturers to 13 cents per gallon, or an increase of 60 percent. 

“Increasing taxes on breweries in Colorado would be like Maine lawmakers going after lobster fishermen or Georgia with peach farmers,” says Shawnee Adelson, executive director of the Colorado Brewers Guild. “You simply don’t pass job-killing tax increases on a sector that has put you on the map, especially in a way that would go around the will of Colorado voters.”

The group points out that Colorado is home to over 420 breweries, 145 wineries and about 100 distilleries, supporting an estimated 131,000 jobs, generating more than $22 billion in economic activity and already supplying some $7.2 billion in taxes annually.

Amplifying the debate is an $850 million state budget deficit that’s expected to result in large cuts to existing prevention, treatment and recovery programs, among other things. Establishing three enterprise fees — one for beer/cider, one for wine and one for spirits — would result in up to $20 million a year collected for each, for a total of $60 million annually. 

“I am really hopeful that it will pass, because we know that the alcohol industry and the alcohol lobby is extremely powerful,” concludes Jackson. “I’m looking forward to continuing the conversations with them. At the end of the day, I think it really is time for us to put people over profits. It’s a $2 billion industry annually, and these small fees don’t even really scratch the surface in comparison.”