Underage drinking violations and other alcohol-related incidents by Georgetown students have dramatically decreased since last year, according to the Metropolitan Police Department and the Advisory Neighborhood Commission. This trend was exemplified over St. Patrick’s Day weekend, Lt. Brian Bray of MPD said.
Only five Georgetown students were arrested in the Second District, which includes much of Georgetown and Burleith, Bray said. Last year, the Voice reported 14 student arrests in the area.
Last year, MPD performed several sweeps through local bars on St. Patrick’s Day weekend, including Champions Sports Bar and Restaurant, Chadwicks, Rhino Bar and Pumphouse and the Tombs. According to Bray, there were no sweeps in the Georgetown area this year.
Lt. Patrick Burke of MPD 2E led several sweeps of downtown bars where about six arrests were made, Bray said. He did not specify if any of the arrests were Georgetown students.
According to the police reports, only one of the five arrests in the Georgetown area was made at a local bar. This arrest, for the use of an illegal ID, occurred at Champions on Wisconsin Avenue. The other four arrests were in the vicinity of the University for charges of underage possession of alcohol, Bray said. All of the arrests took place on Saturday night.
The single arrest at Champions was partly due to advanced ID scanning devices which have deterred many students from taking risks with fake IDs, according to ANC Commissioner Bill Starrels, co-chair of the Alcohol and Beverage committee. Starrels said, however, that the overall reduction in student alcohol violations has been achieved by more than just stricter ID checking.
“Enforcement has scared a lot of people away,” Bray said.
Stricter enforcement by MPD and recent restrictions on local bars proposed by the ANC have been a major part of the decrease in student alcohol violations, according to Starrels. Education and publicity within the University has also played a significant role, he said.
“It’s been a team effort. It’s not just enforcement, it’s education too,” Starrels said. Students are more aware of the risks involved and consequences that are more severe, he said.
Starrels said that he and ANC Commissioner and ABC Co-Chair Peter Pulsifer view the reduction of violations as a dramatic improvement, if not an ideal level.
According to Starrels, the ANC is not pushing for any specific restrictions on local bars right now, but is continually striving to make all local bars equal in their enforcement of underage drinking.
“We are striving for an agreement in which all bars are treated equally,” Starrels said.
