[atlas:bill]

AN ACT Relating to sales of fruit; amending RCW 20.01.440; and adding a new section to chapter 15.17 RCW.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF WASHINGTON:

NEW SECTION. Sec. 1. A new section is added to chapter 15.17 RCW to read as follows:

(1) To provide uniformity in the marketplace and to protect consignors of apples, the director shall revise state standards for grades and packs of apples and require reports of the consignment sales of apples sold under the revised standards.

(2) The director shall adopt revisions to the standards for grades and packs of apples that will clarify the standards in such a way that they will be applied consistently among warehouses and commission merchants. That is, these revisions must provide a level of uniformity that will ensure that the apples of a particular variety, grade, and pack sold from one warehouse will be the same as the apples of the same variety, grade, and pack sold from any other warehouse. For this purpose, the director shall invite a grades and packs committee that is widely recognized within the horticultural industry as representing the interests of the industry regarding grades and packs of apples to recommend by consensus revisions to the standards that it believes will provide that uniformity. If the industry committee recommends such revisions by committee consensus by January 1, 2004, the director shall immediately initiate rule making and give great weight to proposing and adopting the recommendations of the committee. If the committee does not make the recommendations by committee consensus by January 1, 2004, the director shall adopt revisions to the standards the director believes will provide such uniformity by January 1, 2005.

(3) The director shall adopt by rule a system for reporting the sales of apples by variety, grade, and pack. For this purpose, the director shall invite an organization of growers that tracks and distributes information to its members regarding the sale prices of apples sold on consignment, to design by consensus within its organization a sales reporting system. To provide an open and fair assessment of the market and of the performance of commission merchants in the market, the system must provide accurate reporting to apple growers and the apple industry on the sale prices of apples as those sales and prices are segregated by the variety, grade, and pack of apples sold under the revised standards adopted under subsection (2) of this section and by the commission merchant making the sales. If such a consensus-derived system is designed by the organization by January 1, 2004, the director shall immediately initiate rule making and give great weight to proposing and adopting the system designed by the organization. If the organization does not make the recommendations by consensus by January 1, 2004, the director shall adopt rules establishing such a system by January 1, 2005.

Sec. 2. RCW 20.01.440 and 1991 c 109 s 23 are each amended to read as follows:

(1) Every commission merchant shall retain a copy of all records covering each transaction for a period of three years from the date thereof, which copy shall at all times be available for, and open to, the confidential inspection of the director and the consignor, or authorized representative of either. In the event of any dispute or disagreement between a consignor and a commission merchant arising at the time of delivery as to condition, quality, grade, pack, quantity, or weight of any lot, shipment or consignment of agricultural products, the department shall furnish, upon the payment of a reasonable fee therefor by the requesting party, a certificate establishing the condition, quality, grade, pack, quantity, or weight of such lot, shipment, or consignment. Such certificate shall be prima facie evidence in all courts of this state as to the recitals thereof. The burden of proof shall be upon the commission merchant to prove the correctness of his or her accounting as to any transaction which may be questioned.

(2) Nothing in this chapter may be construed as preventing the reporting of sales and prices described in section 1 of this act.