Students stumble into trouble with underage drinking
“I know you’re going to drink,” said GCSU’s Public Safety Officer Greg Williams. “Just do it smart. I don’t think people should be hassled who are just in the bars not causing any sort of social disorder or problem.”
According to The Journal of American College Health, two out of five friends attending a four-year college together binge drink regularly, and minors account for 48 percent of alcohol consumption by college students. The CDC even claims that minors drink 11 percent of all alcohol consumed in the US.
Some, like Williams, say GCSU defies these statistics today.
“I would say that drinking underage is not as big of a problem as it used to be in Milledgeville,” he said.
In Fall 2008, there were 22 arrests of GCSU students in Milledgeville. GCSU had 5,500 students enrolled as undergraduates last semester, 52 percent of whom were underage at some point. This means that one in every 130- or .76 percent – undergraduate students under the age of 21 were arrested.
These statistics cannot downplay the personal importance of an arrest to a minor.
“When you take someone to jail,” Williams said, “that’s something that they will never forget. They will always remember where they were, why they were there and who brought them there.”
Students will also remember the monetary impact of a minor in possession (MIP) charge.
Cindy Potts, administrative assistant for Public Safety, understands the financial weight of a single arrest.
“A $407 ticket for underage drinking could end up costing $1000 after court fees and probation,” she said, “not to mention the 20 hours of mandatory community service.”
With UGA just up the road from Milledgeville and Georgia Southern a few hours away, GCSU has some major contenders to deal with in the party scene. UGA has been ranked No. 7 on the Princeton Review’s list of “Party Schools” and also ranks highly on its “Lots of Beer” and “Lots of Hard Liquor” lists. The party atmosphere at these schools make GCSU seem quite tame.
While arrests for MIP do not happen too often in Milledgeville, they can happen to any underage person that consumes alcohol. One 19 year-old student was arrested a month ago, and chose to tell her story anonymously:
She claims that she went downtown one night, an irregular activity for her, and had been at a bar about five minutes when a friend bought her a drink.
“I took a few sips before I went towards the bathroom to find my friend,” the student said. “I went in that direction with my nearly-full drink in hand. When I was almost to the bathroom, I was tapped on the shoulder and handcuffed inside of the bar. At this time it was only about midnight, and my night was over. I spent the next five hours sitting in jail.”
This student’s story provides a warning to bar patrons of possible arrest or tickets.
Officer Jamaal Hicks, explained that Public Safety- unlike the Milledgeville Police Department- does not earn any revenue from ticketing offenders of the law.
“(Public Safety) does not get a dime, not a penny, for any ticket we write,” he said. “Our only incentive for going out and writing tickets and arresting underage drinkers is for safety issues. We have no interest in going out to do it because we want to make some money.”
Posted by Colonnade Archives
on Mar 6 2009. Filed under Features.
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