From today's News-Gazette:
Costs for extra police and other staff for "Unofficial St. Patrick's Day" were more than $30,000.
Those costs included overtime pay for patrol officers and other staff for police and university personnel, but that was expected with the intended strategy of having more officers on the streets.
Discuss.
At 5%, you would need an incremental $600,000 in taxable sales to make that up. (I am not sure what the city's cut is on a mug of beer.)
"At 5%, you would need an incremental $600,000 in taxable sales to make that up. (I am not sure what the city's cut is on a mug of beer.)"
...if the city uses sales tax only to recover the costs. There were 199 tickets issued at $300/each which equals $59,700.
"There were 199 tickets issued at $300/each which equals $59,700."
Good point. Unofficial is actually a net revenue generator for the City! :-)
The city makes a profit, cops get lots of OT, and our handwringing double-talking nanny mayor keeps on pretending.
The Mayor lies to the citizens then lines the pockets of his cronies. The Feds should investigate before someone dies.
The $59,700 assumes all citations result in fines, and that the city gets all the revenue from the fines.
Michael Fuerst
"The $59,700 assumes all citations result in fines, and that the city gets all the revenue from the fines."
Also true. Anyone know how much goes to the City, County, UI, etc.?
First, as someone previously noted, the revenue projection cited above is contingent on the charged individuals being convicted or waiving their right to trial by paying the citation.
If the offense named on the citation is a municipal ordinance violation, then the city in question gets the revenue, but if it is a state violation, the revenue would be divided differently. Since the UI is not a municipality and can't pass ordinances, my assumption is that UIPD would cite people for violation under the ordinances of whatever municipality the alleged violation occurred.
I don't know whether there is a revenue dividing arrangement between the UI and the municipalities when a city code violation results in a fine, and on top of that, I don't know how the revenue from a fine is divided. For example, I assume that an individual wishes to defend himself in court, he pays court costs if he's unsuccessful. I don't know how court costs are handled if the defendent is acquitted.
At any rate, I don't believe the state gets any of the revenue when only a city ordinance violation and not an Illinois statute violation is involved.
Of course, all this aside, the UI has recourse outside of the criminal justice system on any UI student involved in a crime while he/she is enrolled in the University. And the state through the Secretary of State office now has the statutory authority to revoke the drivers license of anyone under 21 involved in a drinking violation.
All of this Nannyism over people celebrating St Patrick's Day in their own way is what I find most disturbing. If people over 18 want to drink, let them drink, I say. Yes, PC police, I know the legal age is 21, but it should be 18. We trust people on the battlefield and in the voter's booth, but not in a bar.
I think next year I'm going to buy a few hundred red plastic cups for people to carry around with them.
"Yes, PC police, I know the legal age is 21, but it should be 18."
I agree.
That said, since the law is 21 at the moment, I think it should be enforced that way. And preferably without all the hysterical hyperventilating we saw a few weeks ago from people who shouldn't have been surprised that Unofficial was coming up soon.
"At 5%, you would need an incremental $600,000 in taxable sales to make that up. (I am not sure what the city's cut is on a mug of beer.)"
Good point. I am confident that number was met. However, the incremental revenues were probably accounted for using data from the previous years. If they factor in the upside without properly budgeting for the downside, it will still result in a $30,000 deficit. I'm not sure how this was approached, but if I had to take a guess....
At any rate, it is very nice to see someone proactive and vocal about managing costs. I'll take it any way I can get it.
I agree with IP that the laws on the books should be enforced or taken off the books;I feel this creates disrespect for the law and creates an opportunity for politicians to make it look as if they're doing something useful.
The subject of Prohibition in Champaign is the subject of a section of the book Hot Type which is available online through Google Books.
interesting stuff.
The City makes money off this and every bar check arrest!! The money used to fund this is State grant money, Money the City does not have to pay back, and they get all the fine money, They will never change the bar entry age, it would "Kill the goose that lays the golden eggs"
I'm curious – if the "goose" associated with 19-year-old bar entry age is so golden, why don't Charleston, Normal, DeKalb, and Macomb also get in on the gold?
Apparently Champaign and Carbondale are the only Illinois college towns that allow the under-21 crowd to be inside bars.
Gregg,
If the bar entry age was raised to 21 the city could make MORE money because they would be able to collect fines for being underage in a bar in addition to underage position/consumtion of alcohol. Before you say the bars won't let them in if the entry age is raised to 21, remember these are the same bars which aren't supposed to serve alcohol to the 19 and 20 year old allowed to enter their establishments.
And for all those wondering, the Champaign County jail was crowded that weekend, but not with students or revelers. There was actually so little for the extra officers to do that they were sent out to enforce warrants.
All this brouhaha over unofficial is crap. The bar revenue is completely unaffected and the package sales are through the roof. Enforcement cost is really very little and so is the damage to the community. Legitimize it. Embrace it. Close some streets and let it happen. Kids want to party. Big deal.
Was the point of this post to somehow blame the revelers for the $30,000 in police costs? If so, you got it backwards. These adults and the bars they patronize can celebrate St. Patrick's Day however they choose. If our paternalistic government thinks they need to babysit the party, then they can find the money somewhere if they have it and stop bitching. I'm sick of busybodies and authority-fetishists trying to tell others how to live their lives.
Is that the gross figure, or is it net of bribes paid by bars to city?
How does this compare to the costs of a home football game? How about the cost of overtime for the 4th of July parade? This "cost" is an artificial figure. Does it include State police and Secretary of State Police? How does it relate to the "cost" of plowing a 2" snowfall?
Keep it in perspective.
And with respect to the 199 tickets, they were mostly city ordinance violations, they will almost all be paid without a fight, and the city gets 100% of the revenue.
What is the cost of the police everyday? $30K x 365 would be about $10M per year and with a city budget of $90M, I would guess the cop budget is over $5M/year, so this may have been equal to any two days of police work on the average anyway.
It would be a public health nightmare to move all the underage consumption into private apartments and automobiles. Does anyone seriously think that a 19 year old away from home will drink less (or be safer) if the drinking must take place in an older friend's apartment?
And, yes IP, 21 is THE law, but so is 65 mph and we have learned to provide some tolerance and exercise some discretion and society has not exactly crumbled.
"And, yes IP, 21 is THE law, but so is 65 mph and we have learned to provide some tolerance and exercise some discretion and society has not exactly crumbled."
My driving record doesn't indicate there's much tolerance or discretion regarding the 65 MPH speed limit. :-)
Point taken, though I do think there is already a large amount of tolerance and discretion when enforcing drinking age laws, especially in a campus environment. And you're right that society has not crumbled, which is one of the reasons I think the drinking age should be lowered to 18.