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"Cool" parents, watch out! The City Council is considering bring a "Social Host" law to NYC. The law makes parents responsible for any underage drinking in their homes, and, in fact, many other cities and states have social host laws as well. Parents can serve alcohol to their children (within reason, we'd imagine), while it would be illegal to serve alcohol to minors who are not their children. According to 1010WINS, there would be a $350 fine and anywhere from 15 days to 1 year in jail (!). There are also teen party ordinances, where the presence of alcohol amongst the underaged is illegal, but they haven't brought that to the city - yet.
The law was appoved by Long Beach in Nassau County recently, which has been trying to crack down on teen drinking. And the Boston Globe noted that it's hard for DA's to prosecute under the social host law.
The City Council also passed "Imette's Law," which would require bars to hire only licensed bouncers. Many of the City Council's proposed bar and nightlife measures are controversial, such as surveillance cameras recording who goes to clubs, and may be difficult for bars and clubs to comply with, like a rule to have one bouncer per every 75-100 people in the establishment.
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Sure, they should restrict all alcohol everywhere around any teen, especially at family parties. Cause lord knows, treating it like the 8th deadly sin has curbed underage (binge) drinking so far..
aren't parents already responsible for damn children under the age of 18?. it'sad when legislators have to make another law to enforce the other law.
i say ban trenchcoats and cell phones. in fact, lets illegalize anything kids thinks is cool. cigarettes, beer, reefer, kool-aid, bmx bikes, iPods, etc.
This might be a good law in some ways but it would never be implemented with any degree of efficacy and would end up being yet another piece of useless legislation that our elected officials could point to when they run for re-election.
Isn't it enough that you can be sued in a civil court for any accidents that result from a party in your home? As for responsible attitudes toward alcohol, it's one thing to serve (and educate) your own kids, quite another to provide it to others.
i think the best way to curb underage drinking is to keep an open discussion with your kid. My mom doesn't drink or smoke, nor encourages me to, but i can tell her when i'm going to a party what I'll be doing and she makes sure I always have a sober ride home. I have yet to come home drunk or do anything really stupid.
It pissed me off when this year the cops came down heavy on prom night drinking. Its what limos are for! And since they targeted limos, i knew of people going to prom in cars to remain inconspicuous.
Underage drinking happens. For the most part, I think most people did it when they were young at one point or another. To believe that enforcing stricter regulations on something that society as a whole doesn't completely frown upon is confusing and sends the wrong message (the message that drinking in secret is better).
And I still think its ridiculous that its easier for a 16 year old to buy pot, than to drink.
It's safer to have the teens underage drink at your house and let them stay over than to have them underage drink at some shitty chelsea club.
I disagree, it is much better to drink socially outside of the home.
The underage parties are more of a problem in the suburbs, in places, like Long Island, New Jersey, and Connecticut, where you have bing drinking and everyone drives home drunk. Unfortunatly too many people drive into Chelsae from the 'burbs and get trashed and drive home drunk. But, alot more people take the train in, they stay at the bar until 4am, then have breakfast at the diner and take the 5am train home, now they are going to start closing the bars in NYC at 3am...so people instead of having to wait only 1 hour until taking first train home, they will have to wait for 2. This will lead to alot more drunk driving.....