Keeping booze out of the hands of babes
If you're a teen and you want booze do you a) walk into a bar knowing there's a good chance you'll get carded or b) ask a friend or a sibling to buy the booze for you?Most teens surveyed answered "b."
So why is it that a Grand Forks task force looking to put a crimp on teen boozing proposing to license the bartenders?
That's the question some City Council members posed Monday at their meeting.
The task force wants all bartenders to get a $10 license from the city to continue doing their job. It said bartenders need training to avoid serving booze to minors and drunks, something that apparently happens more often here than in Fargo, where a licensing scheme is in place.
Under tough questioning by Council members Curt Kreun, Doug Christensen and Bob Brooks task force members, including Council member Dorette Kerian, said that the licensing is kind of the extent of what the city can do on its own.
The task force report stated that the biggest problems are cultural and PARENTAL and the city can't solve them alone.
Cultural is right. Council President Hal Gershman pointed out that the city had a town hall meeting about teen drinking in March and 100 people showed up, half of them people affiliated with community groups.
One thing the city can do is enforce existing laws more, but the question is where the money will come from.
Christensen said the city already collects $53,000 more in liquor licenses this year than the last so why not put that money to use? He figures cops could troll bars and do ID checks. If you do the math though, $53,000 is one or two extra cops and, as already established, teens aren't drinking at bars.
To see the task force's recommendations, download the council packet here and go to page 20.
I'm not supposed to have an opinion but Dakota does.
posted by Tu-Uyen at 12:02 AM
3 Comments:
Who are the members of the mayor's task force on underage drinking? I only saw 2 names listed in the newspaper article.
I looked on the city website but all I could find is the mayor's chili recipe.
Rich,
You can download that council packet and go to page 25. That gives a listing of all members of the task force.
NOT EFFECTIVE: Finding out how and where kids are drinking, busting them, sending them to special classes, and expecting them to not listen to the over 21 crowd's tales of drunken fun.
My sister, not a bad kid in most respects, got 4, no 5 minors. She had to take counseling classes, where she MADE FRIENDS. None one of this made her less likely to drink. To her thinking, it was just a series of laughable inconveniences she would endure until turning 21, when her adventures became, boom, socially acceptable behavior.
It's like some kind of hazing or initiation that is just understood as part of growing up.
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