On Friday, @GovAbbott forced most brewery taprooms across TX to close down, for a second time, with less than three hours notice. To add insult to injury for those affected by the decision, Sunday, he attended a 2,400 person indoor “Celebrate Freedom Rally." (thread)

Despite adopting all of the health & safety policies laid out in @GovAbbott's own Open Texas plan, including reduced capacity limits, spacing tables six feet apart, staff wellness checks, and aggressive cleaning and disinfecting regimens (with many breweries going much further)..

responsible small businesses are being lumped in with a few rowdy, reckless bars whose licenses were already suspended by @TexasABC, and forced to close socially distanced taprooms/beer gardens while restaurants & other retailers across the state can continue to operate.

A business’s ability to stringently follow social distancing, health, & safety guidelines should have been the deciding factor on whether they can continue to operate—not whether alcohol has historically comprised a higher % of the businesses’ gross receipts than food.

The 1st time breweries were shut down, we asked @GovAbbott to grant breweries the temporary ability to deliver & ship beer directly to customers to provide another outlet for Texans to get local beer while limiting person-to-person contact. Our 18,000 sig. petition was ignored.

We asked for a temporary suspension of TABC excise taxes. We were ignored.

Our industry has received no state level assistance, and now, with @GovAbbott's latest decision, forgiveness for the only assistance some small businesses have received, the federal PPP, is in jeopardy.

Texans, if you want your local breweries to still be in business on the other side of this second shutdown, please continue to vote with your $ and buy local, small, and independent beer—whether that’s on your next grocery run or by buying #BeerToGo directly from the brewery.

If @GovAbbott remains unwilling to reverse course on Friday’s decision or provide leadership with relief for small businesses and their employees, it’s the only way most craft breweries will even have a fighting chance.

(/thread)