BOOZY BUDDIES

The liquor lobby has ginned up a bill to soften penalties for stores caught
illegally peddling alcohol to teenagers

HERE'S A test of your sense of fairness. As the law now stands, stores that
break the law by selling alcohol to minors face a series of worsening
punishments, culminating in "a third strike and you're out of business."

A first offense means a fine, frequently in the range of $500 to $3,000. A
second strike within three years usually means a store can't sell alcohol
for 25 days. A third strike in three years means loss of license.

Since this law went into effect four years ago, only a half-dozen stores
have had their licenses lifted. More than 2,400 have been fined.

The liquor lobby thinks the law is unfair, and it prevailed upon state Sen.
Dede Alpert, a Democrat from San Diego, to carry legislation (SB1696) to
soften its impact on retailers. The bill, which would erase a first strike
if a store owner took corrective steps, has passed the Senate and awaits
action in the Assembly.

The measure is backed by the California Retailers Association, brewers such
as Anheuser-Busch and - unaccountably, in our opinion - the Wine Institute.
The bill's supporters say, in essence, that mistakes are made, and
overworked and harried clerks sometimes sell alcoholic products to
customers under the age of 21, in violation of the law.

Some critics of Alpert's legislation say the liquor lobby covertly
encourages underage drinking because it has a vested financial interest.
(One estimate puts the amount of beer sold nationwide to high school
students each year at 1.1 billion cans.) We don't buy that, although we're
sure a relatively small number of unscrupulous retailers would like to wink
at the age requirements if they could get away with it.

If we were a liquor manufacturer or the Wine Institute, we'd favor the
strictest penalties on those miscreants because they would jeopardize our
good name and good citizenship. How can any responsible business-person
want to make it easier for kids to buy booze?

One grisly piece of evidence why none should want to: The hundreds of
teenagers killed each year in drunken-driving accidents on the nation's
roads.

Especially the Wine Institute should be ashamed. It gives such lip service
to promoting healthy and safe drinking practices. Let's see it walk the
walk.

We don't know how hard it can be for a clerk to check an ID. If the clerk
is too dumb to read a date correctly, maybe the clerk is too dumb to sell
beer. The real problem, we suspect, is that some owners don't bother to
enforce the rule that no alcohol products are ever to be sold to anyone who
looks younger than 30 without checking identification. Until, that is, the
store gets busted.

SB1696 would give lazy or nefarious retailers another chance - a fourth
strike. It's apparently no big deal to Alpert or the Wine Institute that
before a store is closed down, another teenager - or dozens - could walk
out headed for the parking lot with illegal and potentially lethal
purchases. Is loss of business more sacred to them than loss of life?

1998 San Francisco Examiner Page A 12

Checked-by: (Joel W. Johnson)