Halloween VI

Time to revisit Halloween.  Well, there is not much progress since the post on November 13, 2005 Halloween IV-Only 50 more weekends until the next Madtown Halloween or the subsequent post, Halloween V- Nightmare on State Street.

We are down to 40 weekends until the festivities break out. Nothing has changed.  The consumption of alcohol at the private apartment parties has not abated.  It is the drinking of large quantities of alcohol, mostly  underage transgressions, that is the fundamental source of the problem. Until this year-round practice is abated, the flash point will occur every year.

Get the kids back in the bars where they belong. Either that, or force the underage violators to imbibe in speakeasies so quiet that the police can't find them.

There is always going to be illegal and underage drinking. Try to control the worst source of the problem: the over the top, too large, too dangerous, private parties.

Secondly, since there is this fixation on New Orleans' management of Mardi Gras, focus on how they prevent trouble, not how they deal with it after all hell breaks loose. New Orleans does not offer a challenge to every reveler that makes it to the Big Easy to participate in a tear gas laden, head splitting bacchanal at midnight.  New Orleans invites its guests, and asks them to stay within certain boundaries of civility, overlooking when prudent the overexposed breast or fallen-down-drunk.

Finally we arrive at Jim Hopson's commentary in Sunday's Wisconsin State Journal: Make the Bars Pay for Halloween .  The problems are many:

• It takes us down the road to creating one more special district, one more unit of government.  No.
• No matter where the line is drawn there will be one bar inside the district that does not benefit and one bar outside the district that benefits from Halloween.
• It ignores all of the other retailers who profit significantly from the event; true, they don't sell booze. but they also make significant profits from the Halloween gathering.
• Most importantly, it avoids the real problem:getting control of the event without having to muster a brigade of law enforcement from multiple jurisdictions decked out in riot gear. This can be managed rationally with proper planning. It was done in the past and it can be done in the future.