Andrew Shubin

Community must find solutions together

Shubin — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 19:29:53 +0000

FOCUS ON EXCESSIVE DRINKING

Community must find solutions together

Damon Sims and Tom Fountaine

One irony about the problem of dangerous drinking among Penn State students is that it can be either a wedge dividing town and gown or a common cause that binds our community as one.

It is easier to assign blame than to find solutions, and simpler still to think there is nothing more we can do. The actual complexity and subtlety of the issue are easily overlooked in favor of either a simplified “Animal House” worldview or the complaint that too little is being done.

But nothing is gained from pointing fingers or oversimplifying an endlessly vexing problem. We must choose instead to join together — town and gown, permanent residents and students, police and landlords, neighborhood associations and fraternity alumni, hospital administrators and tavern owners, the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board and local schools — one community drawn together by the single purpose of finding a more reasonable and civil relationship between our community and alcohol.

We must choose to partner rather than blame, to persist rather than surrender, to honor students lost to alcohol by aggressively seeking better outcomes in the months and years ahead.

To this cause we invite each of you, and we are grateful for the CDT’s willingness to devote its editorial page to this purpose. The opportunity for our community to join in an ongoing, constructive dialogue about better approaches to the problems related to alcohol is important.

Those problems are not limited to Penn State students, of course. In fact, nearly half of all arrests for alcohol-related crimes in our community involve non-students. Drinking is pursued even in our middle school populations, and binge drinking occurs among too many permanent residents in our community. Still, the high profile of alcohol issues involving Penn State students attracts more than its share of attention, and the data suggest that this attention is deserved.

We lead a group called The Partnership: Campus and Community United Against Dangerous Drinking. For more than a decade, this collection of university and local leaders has pooled its resources and insights in search of initiatives aimed at mitigating dangerous drinking in our community. The group has not yet seen the success it seeks, but as a model for a collective effort to stem the tide of alcohol misuse, it has few peers. There should be no question about the good intent and genuine effort this group has long represented.

Among the partnership’s contributions has been an annual report on its assessment of the alcohol problem in our community. The numbers in the most recent report are not promising. Heavy drinking among Penn State students is on the rise. Alcohol-related emergency room visits by students are increasing, and the average blood-alcohol level of those students is up. The number of student alcohol- related law violations has increased in three of the past four years, as has the number of alcohol- related cases processed by the campus judicial system.

Curiously, other important and seemingly related numbers have not demonstrated comparable increases. These numbers include noise complaints in the borough, assaults and arrests for furnishing alcohol to minors. Even self-reported, high-risk drinking among Penn State students has declined significantly since 2006.

In short, the problem of dangerous drinking in our community is real and increasingly troubling, but the growing perception that the issue is suddenly and unusually out of control is a misperception. The same can be said for the sense that the situation in State College is somehow unusual or even unique. It does not minimize the gravity of the issue in our community to acknowledge that this is a national problem, one that is found in virtually every major college campus community in the country.

As it happens, for instance, we both graduated from another Big Ten school — Indiana University, which in 2002 was named by the Princeton Review as the Party School of the Year. Our longstanding familiarity with the small town of Bloomington and its large university campus assures us that the circumstances in State College are far from unusual.

And therein lies the darkest truth. Despite limited claims of success with this issue by some, most notably the University of Nebraska, there is little empirical evidence that the decades-long efforts to minimize alcohol abuse among college students are working. Despite spending millions of dollars on hundreds of initiatives, nearly every university community acknowledges that dangerous drinking among students remains a growth industry.

Penn State is widely recognized as an early leader in calls to change the culture of alcohol among college students. But our community suffers from these issues despite the university’s substantial and ongoing efforts to address them.

Further complicating the search for solutions are the obvious differences between a campus with 23,000 students in a town of nearly a quarter million people — Lincoln, Neb., for instance — and a 45,000-student campus in a town with only 38,000 permanent residents — our own State College. Throw into that mix differences in the location and design of student housing, including fraternities and large apartment complexes, and you begin to see that differences matter.

What may work for one community is not necessarily going to work for another. Each situation serves up its own distinctive challenges. Comparison in this arena is often less fruitful than it may seem.

We may learn from others and steal good ideas where we find them, but the solution to our problem must, in the end, be uniquely our own. Still, there is much we could do and even more we should consider. With that in mind, we are reaching out to the many constituencies that constitute our community to invite their collaboration in the cause. Starting with student leaders and the students they lead and working our way to faculty, staff, parents, tavern owners, alumni, athletic administrators, media outlets, and on and on, we hope to enlist as many people as we can to this common purpose.

The first order of business is to define the success we seek and identify the metrics to be used to measure our progress. Should our focus be underage drinking or high risk drinking or both? Would increased caseloads in our respective judicial systems be seen as evidence of a growing problem or proof of a stronger response to the problem? Would greater use of emergency medical services for alcohol issues be seen simply as a negative development or as evidence of better recognition of critical situations and more responsible action in the face of them?

Such questions are many and are not easily answered, but neither can they be ignored. They speak to the complexity of the issue we face and the need to face it as one.

Minimally, our community should be able to answer the question: What would success look like? It is not clear that we have consensus on that point. Until we do, however, little additional progress will be made.

One thing is certain, though. More of the same will only promise continued disappointment or worse. We must be open to new approaches, willing to reconsider controversial proposals and quick to recognize repackaged versions of previously failed attempts.

A solution that truly mitigates the problem and sustains a more reasonable and civil culture in our community will require sustained effort. There will surely be more disappointment, loss and tragedy along the way. Patience is required — patience and mutual support and a willingness to accept incremental progress. Cultural changes are slow. Like eating an elephant, they occur one bite at a time.

It is important to note that simply because too many of our students share with others in our community an unhealthy relationship with alcohol does not make our students the problem. Those who may suffer the inclination to do so must resist the temptation to paint Penn State students in such broad strokes. But neither does their status as students grant those attending Penn State the freedom to exercise without consequence misplaced notions about rites of passage. Binge drinking and the incivility and risks that flow from it do not constitute a right, and the consequences for related misbehavior must be plain.

In the end, however, this issue presents a question of choice and personal responsibility. As members of the Penn State family, our students are responsible for themselves and responsible for each other. They must join together in building a successful learning community one choice at a time.

Those of us who are permanent residents of our community must be encouraged to move away from an us versus them dynamic, recognizing instead that it is our students who will ultimately make the personal choices that decide whether our community succeeds or fails on this front. After all, few among us are present in the wee hours of a night when the choice is made to have just one more drink, or buy a case of beer for a minor friend, or urinate in the yard in which one is standing, or let a friend climb behind the steering wheel when he or she clearly should not. It is in the community of friends and other peers that these choices are made, and those communities must establish and enforce, either formally or informally, expectations that discourage peers from bad choices.

The challenge we ask all of you to join will not be easy or brief. Nor are we certain of success. We are, however, optimistic that our community — a collection of permanent residents and students alike — has reached a tipping point in its relationship with alcohol. A student’s tragic death, disturbances in the Highlands neighborhood, the party school moniker — these elements and more have combined to propel the collaboration and common purpose we require if change is to occur.

Laws, rules, policies and enforcement may be part of the answer, but not all of it. Education will certainly be important, but education alone has proven inadequate to the cause. Counseling in certain instances will be critical, but resource limitations challenge our ability to scale personalized intervention to all of our students. Social marketing that promotes new attitudes and understanding may help, but only in concert with many other elements. More diverse social and cultural offerings in our downtown area must be sought, but for all their appeal they will not be the central solution.

In short, there is no single magic answer, no narrow collection of responses that will lead us to the end we seek. The causes are many, and the solutions must be many, too. Still, it has been said that no problem can stand the assault of sustained thinking and collective action. We ask only that you join us in that belief.

Damon Sims is vice president for student affairs at Penn State. Tom Fountaine is State College borough manager. This is the first of weekly columns and letters on this topic.

http://www.centredaily.com/331/story/1734879.html?storylink=omni_popular#ixzz0d5X9845E

Underage Citation Dismissal Resulting From Uncalibrated PBT Device

Shubin — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 13:54:27 +0000

The Pennsylvania Superior Court dismissed a Montgomery County Underage Drinking citation where the Commonwealth relied on PBT results as the primary evidence of a sixteen year old’s guilt and introduced no evidence that the device had been calibrated as required by Pennsylvania law.

In Commonwealth v. Brigidi, the Superior Court held that the “explicit language of the enabling statute” requires the Commonwealth to demonstrate that the breath testing device be “calibrated and tested for accuracy within a period of time and in a manner specified by regulations of the Departments of Health and Transportation” in order to be admissible. In this case, the Superior Court found that the Commonwealth’s failure to introduce calibration evidence was likely fatal, and remanded the case back to the trial court with direction to dismiss the case.

New policy for IFC recruitment

Shubin — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 16:01:55 +0000

IFC will enforce alcohol-free recruitment events starting this semester.

By Colleen Boyle and Jourdan Cole, Collegian Staff Writers

The Interfraternity Council (IFC) announced Sunday all spring recruitment events will be alcohol-free, which comes on the heels of a two-month-old social policy tightening the rules for all social events.

IFC President Max Wendkos (senior-marketing and psychology) said one goal of the “values-based” recruitment strategy is to provide for the safety of all participating in the recruitment process, which begins next Monday.

“With this new recruitment program, we are looking to, one, ensure safety of our recruits, and two, provide for our fraternities a recruitment of students that would reflect the values that our organizations were founded upon,” he said.

IFC officials believe the new policy will not deter potential recruits for the spring semester. But spring recruits who violate the policy will be disqualified from recruitment, Wendkos said.

“We have developed a system of fines and social repercussions to discourage our chapters from violating the new policy,” he said.

Fraternities will be penalized with a $1,000 fine if found in violation of the policy, IFC Vice President for Membership Mark Mixon said.

He said that at no point should alcohol and new members be in the same place at the same time during recruitment. A third party will monitor the formal recruitment events, he said, and IFC officials will be spot-checking fraternities during regular social events to ensure the policy is being upheld.

Wendkos said he also plans to continue the policy into the fall 2010 semester, tweaking the policy as IFC leaders identify ways to improve it.

“While this semester is definitely going to serve as a test run, we do intend to maintain that part of the policy,” he said.

The council hopes with these new regulations chapters will be able to “increase the exposure of

potential new members to the core values in fraternity life,” including brotherhood and virtue, according to an IFC press release issued Sunday night.

Dan Cartwright, IFC vice president of communications, said he is unsure of what the effects of the policy will be in the immediate future but is hopeful about the long-lasting effects.

“We predict that these changes in policy will have a positive effect on the community,” Cartwright (junior- energy, business and finance) said.

Mendkos and Cartwright both emphasized the importance of maintaining the ideals of their organizations and how this policy will assist in that goal.

“It’s incredibly important in our community to have members who carry these values with them day to day,” Wendkos said.

University Park Undergraduate Association President Gavin Keirans supported the new policy, which he said will affect the campus as a whole.

“I think the focus is on negatives when there is a laundry list of good within the greek community,” Keirans (senior-business management) said. “Away from alcohol is a positive. It’s important that the IFC and the community as a whole is focused on improvement.”

PSU Warns Of Computer Privacy Breach

Shubin — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 22:35:41 +0000

STATE COLLEGE, Pa. — Penn State University said nearly 30,000 individuals may have had their Social Security numbers exposed because of a privacy breach caused by infected university computers.

A school spokeswoman said Tuesday there is no evidence the information has been accessed by unauthorized parties, but that the university is being cautious in notifying people their information is on an infected computer.

The school announced Dec. 23 that the computers have been hit by so-called “malware,” or malicious software.

More than 14,000 of the records were at the main University Park campus. The school said Tuesday those individuals have been contacted.

Another 15,000 are at a still-unnamed branch campus, though that investigation is not complete.

Posted: 6:07 pm EST December 29, 2009

Updated: 12:21 pm EST December 30, 2009

ACLU to challenge nuisance ordinance

Shubin — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 19:06:20 +0000

Proposed act unconstitutional, group says
Mike Joseph
STATE COLLEGE — A proposed borough ordinance to curb the impact of rowdy parties by holding hosts responsible for the illegal activities of guests has come under fire from a national organization that advocates individual rights.

The American Civil Liberties Union told State College in a letter Friday that the borough’s proposed “nuisance gathering ordinance,” which is scheduled for a public hearing Monday night, violates the U.S. Constitution.

The ACLU letter, from staff attorney Valerie Burch to council President Elizabeth Goreham, says the ordinance’s “liability scheme … runs roughshod over and through well-established constitutional rights.” If the borough passes the ordinance, Burch says in the letter, the ACLU of Pennsylvania will entertain requests to challenge it in court.

Goreham said Saturday that the ACLU letter “casts a shadow over that ordinance and we really need to look for another way — this is apparently not the way.”

The proposed ordinance was modeled after similar ones adopted recently in two other college towns — Michigan State University’s hometown in East Lansing and Bloomsburg, home of Bloomsburg University, borough Police Chief Tom King told council.

The State College proposal says the host of a gathering of 10 or more people may be held in violation of law and subject to summary offense fines from $300 to $600, or 30 days in jail, if the gathering results in certain illegal activities at or within 100 feet of the location.

The illegal activities of party guests that would result in nuisance gathering ordinance violations by party hosts include: excessively loud noise; brawls, fights, quarrels, obscene conduct or other public disturbances; open containers; underage drinking; public drunkenness; public urination or public defecation; unlawful furnishing of intoxicating beverages; criminal mischief; sale of controlled substance; and lewdness.

The ACLU said the ordinance is “overbroad.” In criminalizing the hosting of gatherings that result in illegal activities, the ACLU says, the proposal prohibits constitutionally protected activities such as political and religious meetings that may inadvertently result in illegal activities.

As an example, the ACLU cites a pre-election meeting whose hosts could be found in violation if a political opponent stands outside the meeting, shouts noisily and litters the street with handbills.

“Such an ordinance chills the right to freely associate, protected by the First Amendment,” the ACLU letter says.

The ACLU also said the proposed ordinance violates the First Amendment by holding those who exercise First Amendment rights liable for the actions of others, and by trying to shift the costs of police services to the organizer of events.

“The First Amendment does not allow government to hold an event organizer categorically responsible for the actions of others … loosely resulting from the event,” the ACLU said.

The ACLU’s third problem with the proposal centers on the right to due process under the Fifth Amendment. By punishing the host, the ACLU says, “the ordinance holds responsible those who lack both intent to act illegally and a ‘responsible relation’ to the illegal actors.”

In an interview Saturday, Burch suggested it will take more than just language tweaking to erase ACLU concerns.

“You simply can’t criminalize someone for just having a party,” she said. “You just can’t make a law that violates the U.S. Constitution, and of course the Constitution trumps the borough of State College.”

Penn State student Brett Fisher, a candidate for council in Tuesday’s election, has criticized the proposed nuisance gathering ordinance for the very reasons cited by the ACLU.

Another ordinance scheduled for a public hearing at Monday’s council meeting would change the definition of “student home” in the borough codes to make it harder for single-family homes owned by students or students’ family members to rent rooms in the home to unrelated students.

Still another proposal would specify permit uses of former fraternity houses to include community or day care centers, homes for the elderly, nursing homes, medical clinics, offices or private schools.

Council does not plan to act on either of these ordinances Monday. Final consideration is scheduled for the Dec. 7 council meeting. For more information, go to www.statecollegepa.us. Mike Joseph can be reached at 235-3910.

Drug law challenged: Broad guidelines include bus stops, PSU property

Shubin — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 18:45:26 +0000

Sara Ganim
STATE COLLEGE — Scott Marion never thought selling $35 worth of marijuana to a college buddy might land him in state prison for more than two years.

Sentencing guidelines for that kind of crime call for probation to 30 days in county jail — with one huge exception.

If you are caught selling drugs within 1,000 feet of a school, state law says prosecutors can seek a two-year mandatory minimum sentence.

“The purpose was to discourage and penalize drug dealing near schools and near schoolchildren,” said Mark Bergstrom, director of the state Commission on Sentencing.

But the law also encompasses any location within 1,000 feet of colleges, universities, school bus stops, or any property owned by colleges or schools.

That includes the downtown apartment where Marion lived — where he sold the roughly three joints of marijuana. If he’d been outside a “school zone,” Marion would have needed to sell more than 10 pounds of marijuana to receive a sentence above two years.

“The problem here is we have a major university and some kids do experiment with marijuana at major universities,” said Chief Public Defender Dave Crowley. “It’s college kids, for the most part, selling to other college kids, very, very, very small amounts. Do you really want to ruin people’s lives for that stupid mistake?”

Earlier this month, the sentencing commission released a 490-page report on a two-year study of, among other things, school zone mandatory sentences.

Its recommendation: Repeal it.

The reasons: “First, 1,000 feet of a zone really does cover a lot of territory, especially in urban areas,” Bergstrom said. “You’re really covering blocks and blocks that don’t seem to have a connection to the school at all. It’s very broad.

“The second thing, it didn’t seem to have that connection with the (law’s) original purpose.”

Bergstrom said there are other tools that can be used to punish people who sell drugs to children. A sentencing enhancement can be enforced at the discretion of a judge and would carry about the same extra jail time as the school zone’s mandatory minimum, which allows judges no room to sway.

“I think that we all knew that these mandatories didn’t work for any legitimate purpose,” said State College defense attorney Andrew Shubin. “We knew that they didn’t deter crimes. … We all know that we should not be using school zone mandatories when two consenting college kids are exchanging drugs in a dorm room.”

Debating the mandate

A map of State College shows a majority of the borough is within a school zone. Even outside of the borough, plots of land owned by Penn State, churches with day care centers, unmarked school bus stops — even during summer vacation — all are considered schools. Anything within three football fields of them is within a school zone.

“It’s sort of hard to know exactly if you’re in a school zone or not in a school zone,” Bergstrom said. “So if we’re saying we want to provide a safe zone for kids, people should know what that zone is and it’s kind of hard to tell.”

If the legislature doesn’t want to repeal the law, the commission recommended a second option: Amend the law to reduce the “zone” from 1,000 feet around a school to 250 feet, and remove colleges and universities from the mix.

Centre County District Attorney Michael Madeira, who is on the sentencing commission as a nonvoting representative of the state District Attorneys Association, says that while the association has yet to take a position, he disagrees with the findings.

Madeira, as well as prosecutors across the state, says the school zone mandatory rule is a great tool that prosecutors across the state use to negotiate plea agreements.

“By suggesting that a school zone mandatory could apply, and therefore garnering a plea from someone who sold drugs … helps our system,” Madeira said.

If his office stopped using the school zone law, he said, “every defense attorney worth their salt is going to say, ‘Let’s go to trial. What do we have to lose? My guy’s going to get convicted anyway. Or if he gets convicted, he’s not going to do any more time.’ ”

The commission found that this practice floods jails with people who weren’t the intended targets of the law. And defendants sentenced to prison are much more likely to reoffend, it noted.

Shubin calls Madeira’s explanation for why he uses the school zone law “a victory of red meat politics over what’s right and what’s just.”

“Trials are a constitutional right, and it’s cynical to say ‘Let’s avoid them by instituting mandatories,’ ” Shubin said.

The report, which surveyed judges, prosecutors, defendants and attorneys, also found that school zone mandatory sentences were unevenly applied across the state.

“In some counties, it was used in every way possible and in other counties it wasn’t really used at all,” Bergstrom said.

The study showed the sentences were used most in Berks County, and least in Allegheny and Philadelphia counties.

The mandatory also makes no distinction between the type of drug or the quantity being sold. One-quarter ounce of marijuana draws the same sentence as a large quantity of heroin.

“To me, sentencing should be based on the type of drug, the quantity of drug, and it should be left to the court and not to the district attorney’s office,” said defense attorney Jason Dunkle.

Attorney Stacy Parks Miller, who is Madeira’s opponent in the Nov. 3 election, said the law had “a well intentioned purpose” but went far beyond that.

“Even though I fully support other mandatory sentencing provisions, including the mandatory sentence for drugs sold directly to a minor and mandatory sentences based upon the weight of drugs, I am not a fan of this mandatory,” Parks Miller said. “I prefer sentencing to be based upon actual facts of the case, not some geographical measurement of proximity of the incident to the border of property owned by Penn State University, which is often how we see it used.”

Trial comes at cost

Madeira said he believes those who wrote the law intended universities to be considered school zones, otherwise, “they wouldn’t have said ‘university.’ ”

But, he said, his office doesn’t typically enforce the mandatory sentence called for by the school zone law unless a case goes to trial.

That, defense attorneys say, has a chilling effect.

“When a prospective client is charged with delivery of drugs in the State College area, I tell them right away that the school zone statute may be applied,” Dunkle said. “I tell them that if we fight the case in any manner … you are going to state prison if we lose. It’s either plead guilty or face state prison. Someone with four cases, you’re looking at eight years. People who legitimately should fight a case simply won’t because of the fear of the school zones being applied.”

Shubin recalled one case in which a 19-year-old education major and honor student, who had never before been in trouble, was asked to do a “favor” for a friend who had sold him pot.

The student sold the friend some marijuana on two occasions. He soon found out the friend was working with police to arrange the buys to get himself out of a jam.

Shubin said he believed he had a good chance of winning if the case went to trial.

“None of these things mattered,” Shubin said. “All that mattered was that if I was going to test the case … they were going to ask four to eight years.”

Shubin said his client, unwilling to take the risk, pleaded guilty to a felony and spent six months in jail.

“He’s now in a community college, he left Penn State because there was really no sense in him being here,” Shubin said. “A kid that would have earned $60-$80- $90,000 a year as an educator … he’s afraid to even apply for jobs with a felony on his record.”

“The mandatories, in my view, very cynically gave the District Attorney’s Office the opportunity to take a probation case, scare the bejeezus out of kids who have a lot to lose and got them to be confidential informants and set up their friends, elders, colleagues,” he said.

Scott Marion declined to comment while he waits to hear if the state Supreme Court will hear his appeal on the use of mandatories in his case. His appeal argues prosecutors didn’t prove his location was 1,000 feet from Penn State because he was six stories up in an apartment building.

STATE COLLEGE PROPOSED NUISANCE GATHERING ORDINANCE

Shubin — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 10:35:18 +0000

ORDINANCE NO.

NUISANCE GATHERING ORDINANCE

Be it ENACTED AND ORDAINED by the Borough Council of the Borough of State College, and it is hereby Enacted and Ordained by authority of same, as follows:

SECTION 1. Amend the State College Borough Codification of Ordinances, Chapter V. Conduct. To add a new Part J. Nuisance Gathering Ordinance, to read as follows:

PART J

NUISANCE GATHERING

Section 1001. Purpose and Findings. The Borough of State College intends to preserve the peace, health, safety, and welfare of the residents and neighborhoods in the municipality by reducing the illegal behavior and conduct often occurring at events or gatherings that
seriously detracts from the peace, health, safety, and welfare of the community.

The Borough of State College finds that:

a. Events and gatherings held on private or public property where persons gather and where Liquor or Malt or Brewed beverages are consumed and/or illegal controlled substances are used by persons attending such events or gatherings often results in disruptive, disorderly, destructive, violent, and hazardous conditions that constitute a threat to peace, health, safety, and welfare of the community that require prevention, response to, and/or abatement.

b. Often events and gatherings held on private or public property where persons gather and where Liquor or Malt or Brewed beverages are consumed and/or illegal controlled substances are used by persons attending such events or gatherings result in one or more of the following:

(1) Liquor or Malt or Brewed beverage-related or illegal controlled substance-related traffic crashes; or

(2) Liquor or Malt or Brewed beverage-related or illegal controlled substance-related injuries from falls and other accidents; or

(3) Overconsumption of Liquor or Malt or Brewed beverage requiring emergency medical treatment; or

(4) Providing Liquor or Malt or Brewed beverage to persons under 21 years of age; or

(5) Residents being awakened overnight from loud noises; or

(6) Violent outbursts that result in physical injury to persons; or

(7) Residents having their property damaged or stolen.

c. These events and gatherings that become unlawful public nuisances result in an inordinate amount of police service resources deployed to these events or gatherings resulting in additional costs to the Borough of State College taxpayers. Because of these inordinate costs, it is necessary to recover the police service costs for certain unlawful public nuisances.

Section 1002. Authority. This ordinance is enacted pursuant to XXXXXXXX

Section 1003. Definitions. For purposes of this ordinance, the following terms have the following meanings:

Event or gathering. Event or gathering means any group of three (3) or more persons who have assembled or gathered together for a social function or other activity on public or private property whether indoors or outdoors.

Host. Host means to aid, conduct, allow, entertain, organize, supervise, control, or overtly permit a gathering or event.

Liquor. Liquor as defined by Title 18 – Pennsylvania Crimes Code Section 6310.6

Malt or brewed beverages. Malt or brewed beverages as defined by Title 18 — Pennsylvania Crimes Code Section 6310.6

Person. Person means any individual, partnership, co-partnership, corporation, or any association of one or more individuals.

Police Service Costs. Police Service Costs means the cost to the Borough of State College for police services rendered in responding to a call at a nuisance gathering or otherwise maintaining order and public peace and safety and stopping public disturbances at a nuisance
gathering, including, but not limited to, the salaries and other compensation of police officers, appropriate administrative costs allocable thereto, the cost of repairing damaged Borough of State College equipment and property, and the cost of any medical treatment of injured police officers. The cost for salaries and other compensation of police officers plus the administrative costs shall be established annually by the Borough of State College Finance Department. Cost of
repairing damaged equipment and the cost of any medical treatment of injured police officers shall be based on actual costs.

Premise. Premise means any home, yard, fraternity house, farm, field, land, apartment, condominium, hotel or motel room, or other dwelling unit. or a hall or meeting room, park, or any other place of assembly,public or private, whether occupied on a temporary or permanent basis, whether occupied as a dwelling or specifically for a party or other social function, and whether owned, leased, rented, or used with or without permission or compensation.

Underage Person. Underage person is any individual under twenty-one (21) years of age.

Section 1004. Declaration of nuisance gathering. An event or gathering that results in one or more of the following illegal activities at a premise or on neighboring public or private property is hereby declared to be an unlawful public nuisance as defined herein:

a. Excessive, unnecessary, or unreasonably loud noise which does or is likely to disturb the comfort, quiet, or repose of the neighborhood (Section 5503 of the Pennsylvania Crimes Code – Title 18) and/or (Chapter V, Part A, Section 103 of the Borough of State College
Codification of Ordinances); or

b. Public disturbances, brawls, fights, or quarrels or Indecent or obscene conduct (Section 5503 of the Pennsylvania Crimes Code – Title 18); or

c. Open container – (Chapter V, Part C., Section 302 c. of the Borough of State College Codification of Ordinances); or

d. Purchase, consumption, possession, or transportation of Liquor or Malt or Brewed beverages (Section 6308 of the Pennsylvania Crimes Code -Title 18); or

e. Public drunkenness (Section 5505 of the Pennsylvania Crimes Code – Title 18); or

f. Public urination or defecation (Section 5503 of the Pennsylvania Crimes Code – Title 18); or

g. Unlawful sale, furnishing, or consumption of intoxicating beverages (Section 6310.1 of the Pennsylvania Crimes Code – Title 18); or,

h. Unlawful deposit of trash or litter – Section 6501 of the Pennsylvania Crimes Code (Title 18); or

I. Criminal mischief (Section 3304 of the Pennsylvania Crimes Code -Title 18); or

j. Sale, manufacture, possession of any controlled substances as defined in The Controlled Substance, Drug, Device and Cosmetic Act” Act of 1972, P.L. 233, No. 64; or

k. Open lewdness or indecent exposure (Section 5901 or Section 3127 of the Pennsylvania Crimes Code – Title 18); or

1. Other illegal conduct or condition which injures, or endangers the safety, health, or welfare of the neighborhood.

Section 1005. Prohibited Act. Any premise owner, occupant, tenant, or other person having any possessory control, individually or jointly with others, of any premise who sponsors, conducts, hosts, invites, or overtly permits an event or gathering that at any time of the event or gathering to become an unlawful public nuisance as defined in Section 4 is hereby deemed to have committed a violation of this section.

Section 1006. Penalty for violation.

(a) Any person who violates Section 5 is guilty of a summary offense punishable a fine of not less than $300 nor more than $600 or by imprisonment for not more than 30 days, or both.

(b) For a second or subsequent violation of Section 5 in a l2-month period, the person is guilty of a summary offense punishable by a fine of not less than $500 nor more than $1,000 or by imprisonment for not more than 90 days, or both.

(c) A criminal penalty provided for under subsections (a) and (b) of this section may be imposed in addition to any penalty that may be imposed for any other criminal offense arising from the same conduct.

Each act of violation and every day upon which such violation occurs shall constitute a separate offense.

Section 1007. Payment for Police Service Costs Required. Any premise owner, occupant, tenant, or other person having any possessory control, individually or jointly with others, of any premise who sponsors, conducts, hosts, invites, or overtly permits an unlawful public nuisance
event or gathering shall pay the police service costs for the response, investigation, documentation, and prosecution of the second and any subsequent unlawful public nuisance events or gatherings within a 180 day period of time.

Section 1008. Notice of Police Service Costs. Whenever the police are called to respond to and declare a property in violation of this ordinance, a representative of the Police Department shall notify the owner of the private property where the nuisance gathering took place
and also the Person in Charge (PIC) of such property if the owner has designated a “PIC” in accordance with the Borough of State College’s Property Maintenance Code (Chapter IV, Part L, Section 1204, Chapter 9, Section 901.2), by regular mail at the last known address of such owner
and/or Person in Charge. This notification will include at a minimum that the police identified a nuisance gathering at the owner’s property and that if the police are again called to respond to a nuisance gathering at such property within 180 days after their initial response, such owner shall be required to pay police service costs to the Borough of State College for such responses.

Section 1009. Collection of Police Service Costs. For the second and all subsequent responses to unlawful public nuisance events or gatherings within 180 days as provided for in Section 7 of this Ordinance, the Chief of Police or his/her duly authorized designee shall notify the Borough of State College Finance Department in writing of the name and address of the owner of the private property where the nuisance gathering took place, the dates of the initial and subsequent
response(s), and necessary details related to the billable costs as listed in Section 3, (f) for the subsequent response. The Borough of State College Finance Director or his/her duly authorized designee shall then bill the owner for the appropriate amount and which shall be due and payable to the Borough of State College within thirty (30) days of such billing.

Section 1010. Failure to Pay Police Service Costs. Any police service costs which have not been paid within thirty (30) days of the billing therefore maybe collected, together with a penalty of ten percent (10%) thereof and interest at the rate of ten percent (10%) per annum added thereto, by civil action against the owner and/or may be imposed or assessed against the owner’s private property as a municipal claim as provided by law.

Section 1011. Severability. If any section, subsection, sentence, clause, phrase, word, or other portion of this ordinance is, for any reason, held to be unconstitutional or invalid, in whole, or in part, by any court of competent jurisdiction, such portion shall be deemed severable, and such unconstitutionality or invalidity shall not affect the validity of the remaining portions of this ordinance, which remaining portions shall continue in full force and effect.

SECTION 3. Effective Date. This ordinance shall take effect thirty (30) days following its final passage and adoption.

STATE COLLEGE Council targets rowdy parties

Shubin — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 10:29:40 +0000

STATE COLLEGE — Council on Monday began to look at a “nuisance gathering ordinance” intended to give police a new way to cite hosts with summary offenses if their guests break the law.

Police Chief Tom King told council the intent is not to replace laws but to add to what police have to work with now.

“We’re looking for additional ways for a local ordinance to supplement the crimes code,” he said. “When we can’t absolutely prove who furnished the alcohol … then tenants or property owners are responsible.”

The ordinance, based on versions already on the books at Michigan State’s hometown of East Lansing and Bloomsburg, home of Bloomsburg University, could establish a summary offense punishable by a $300 to $600 fine or jail time, according to an early draft circulated at Monday’s council meeting.

The ordinance draft also provides for recovery by the borough of police costs for the response, investigation, documentation and prosecution of the second and subsequent “unlawful nuisance gathering” within a 180-day period.

A nuisance gathering, according to the ordinance draft, is an event or gathering that results in any of a dozen illegal activities:

Noise ordinance violations; fights; open container violations; underage drinking; public drunkenness; public urination or defecation; unlawful sale of intoxicating beverages; unlawful littering; criminal mischief; possession or sale of controlled substances; lewdness or indecent exposure; and “other illegal conduct or condition which injures, or endangers the safety, health or welfare of the neighborhood.”

King told council that such ordinances were first developed on the West Coast about a decade ago and have since moved east. He said East Lansing “has had a lot of success with this” but Bloomsburg hasn’t used it much.

The police budget amounts to nearly half of the entire borough’s operating budget. Council will likely schedule a work session on the proposed ordinance in the fall.

Mike Joseph

Centre Daily Times

- mjoseph@centredaily.com

Attorney Andrew Shubin Succeeds in Getting All Charges Against Fraternity Dismissed

Shubin — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 21:15:51 +0000

September 30, 2009, Bellefonte, PA

District Justice Carmine Prestia dismissed furnishing alcohol to minors and related alcohol violations against Tau Epsilon Phi after a preliminary hearing in Centre County Central Criminal Court. The State College Police charged the fraternity with misdemeanors following a summer party at the house. The Commonwealth called an eighteen year old student, who had been cited for underage drinking and disorderly conduct after being caught urinating in bushes, to testify against the fraternity in return for favorable consideration from the District Attorney’s office. The student testified that he drank several beers at the fraternity house. The court agreed with Attorney Andrew Shubin’s argument that there was insufficient evidence linking the fraternity as a corporate entity to any criminal wrongdoing and dismissed all charges.

Cracking the College Enforcement Initiative

Shubin — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 00:41:38 +0000

By Jack Keefe and Dougal Sutherland

Courtesy of The Daily Gazette

The raid by state police on a party at Haverford College and the “College Enforcement Initiative” cited in part as the raid’s cause have put many members of the college community on edge. Many questions have emerged to order the confusion generated from that raid: What is the College Enforcement Initiative? Why did the state police target Haverford? Will they target Swarthmore? What can be done to prevent that?

The Haverford Raid & The College Enforcement Initiative

Sgt. William La Torre of the Liquor Control Board notably indicated that the raid was one of many measures planned under the aegis of the College Enforcement Initiative, which entails an enhanced enforcement focus on underage drinking at colleges. La Torre, Commander of the district office for Delaware, Chester, and Philadelphia counties, said that the purpose of that initiative is to “get the word out” on college campuses about the penalties for underage drinking.

The goal of the program, said La Torre, is to make a series of highly visible alcohol “busts” at various colleges and universities in the area, especially during September and October. The hope is that students will realize “what the penalties are” and then be able to “make an informed decision” about whether to drink.

“The legislators of Pennsylvania have deemed that if you’re under 21, you shouldn’t drink… All I can do is enforce the laws on the books. With respect to whether they break the law in private or in public, either way they’re breaking the law.”

Though a report from the Liquor Control Board described the initiative [page 96; file is a 900kb PDF] as “a cooperative program with local and university law enforcement agencies,” during the raid at Haverford neither township police nor Haverford’s Safety & Security department were notified until the raid was under way. Their counterparts at Swarthmore, Chief Brian Craig of the Swarthmore borough police and Owen Redgrave of Public Safety, both said that the state police would be under no obligation to contact either organization were a similar raid to occur at Swarthmore.

In an interview with the Gazette, La Torre said that normally, his office works “hand-in-hand” with schools’ law enforcement agencies. In the Haverford incident, however, he cited two mitigating factors. One was that Haverford Safety & Security department, like Swarthmore’s Public Safety, is not a police agency. Although certain members of the department may be sworn police officers, the department falls entirely under the purview of the college administration. La Torre called that “really atypical;” larger schools generally handle their security through full police departments.

Moreover, the anonymous tipster at Haverford claimed that the administration was intentionally “turning a blind eye” towards underage drinking on campus, and by extension, campus security. Because La Torre’s office “didn’t know whether that allegation was true,” they wanted to “maximize the element of surprise” and so waited until arriving to contact Safety & Security. (Upon later investigation, La Torre said that his office “didn’t see any evidence” that the administration was behaving irresponsibly.)

If the department receives a tip or requests for help from anyone, they will look into it, as they did in the Haverford incident. In those situations, La Torre said that his unit “does a full investigation, using all resources available”—including Facebook. “We look for events that are advertised as occurring,” he said, “and then investigate further.”

The Swarthmore Police Department’s policy is based on strict enforcement of the law. Chief Craig said, “When we become aware of [underage drinking], we do enforce” the relevant laws. Yet although the College campus is on their regular patrol routes, the “primary purpose of [those] patrols is the safety of everyone involved… they’re not specifically for underage drinking enforcement.” He said that Swarthmore police “do not go in buildings unless we have a specific call or need to do that.” His main concern with the issue, historically, has been that “the College handles things the way they’re supposed to,” especially with respect to local high school students showing up to College parties.

In the Haverford raid, students were only cited for underage drinking—no one was charged with the misdemeanor of providing alcohol to a minor. La Torre said that this is not true of all of his department’s activities at colleges. When it’s clear who is furnishing the alcohol, he said, as when “an undercover officer pays his $5 and gets his cup” for beer at a frat party, the officers may attempt to detain individuals identified as the providers first.

Some commentators have also taken note of the fact that the party at Haverford was outside, which is a legally distinct situation from if it was inside a college-owned (or private) building. La Torre verified that the distinction is sometimes meaningful, but wanted to dispel the notion that indoor spaces are completely off-limits from the police. “In many situations we would need a warrant,” he said, but “there are also many circumstances that would not require a warrant.” The observation of any crimes occurring “within plain view,” or when there are “exigent circumstances regarding someone’s health or welfare,” would fall into the latter category of circumstances.

The Administration’s Response

In Assistant Director for Student Life Kelly Wilcox’s estimation, the Haverford raid has “added credibility to” efforts undertaken by the Dean’s Office to provide support for students on the issue of alcohol. After the raid, Wilcox sent an e-mail out to party hosts, PAs, and RAs reminding them that “it is really in student’s best interests to have party permits” so that both the administration and Public Safety are aware of events and their individual concerns, and so that the College can better respond to problems that may arise at any given event. Wilcox informally estimated that “within 24 hours” of the Haverford raid, the number of students coming for party permits for events small and large “increased 3-fold.”

With regards to the safety of Swarthmore parties, Wilcox also emphasized the role of the Party Associates in checking IDs, marking hands of students of age, managing guest sign-in, regulating crowd control, enforcing the terms of a given party permit, looking out for overly intoxicated students, and serving as first responders for incidents at parties. (Background reports to the Gazette indicate that, for the vast majority of weekend events occurring these past two weeks, Party Associates were on-site at parties checking IDs and enforcing entrance policies.)

“That [the Dean’s Office’s style] is to educate and to be a resource… is pretty unique to this campus, and it’s one of our strongest traits,” Wilcox said. She cited an example of a recent conversation wherein a student contacted her directly with concerns that drinks at a particular party had been mixed with high-proof grain alcohol that led partygoers to significantly underestimating their alcohol consumption. Wilcox used her party-permit records to contact the host of that party. “Within 5 minutes,” the former host had responded to Wilcox to address her remarks, and indicated the specific measures they would take to resolve said concern at future events they would host.

“I really appreciated the fact that a student felt comfortable enough to share their concern… and the willingness of the host to communicate,” Wilcox said. “I wasn’t interested in adjudicating, I was interested in moving forward, in going ‘here on out, how can I make this event safe?’ … No student on campus should be surprised by what’s in their drink.”

Wilcox also emphasized that while the administration is not tolerant of lawbreaking occurring at parties hosted on-campus, that their primary focus with regards to underage drinkers is their safety. “Don’t hesitate to ask seek help: any ramifications of a citation or anything else would be minor compared to ensuring someone’s safe, healthy, and being taken care of,” Wilcox said.

Effects on Campus Life

Student conversation has concentrated in part on the question of whether Swarthmore will be targeted, and, if so, when. A member of DU said that last weekend’s Toga Party saw “noticeably fewer” attendees than it had in past years, though there were still “a decent amount of people” who showed up. He attributed that decline to rumors that the police might be conducting a raid on Saturday night. Although to his knowledge there was no reason to think that DU in particular might be targeted, “a lot of people were worried that the cops were coming” to DU. “These things kind of take a life of their own,” he said. “There was an email from the Worth RAs, and then that circulated.”

Indeed, an email sent this past weekend to residents of the Worth dormitory by the Worth RAs warned students to be especially cautious of many activities on Saturday night in particular, especially those involving drinking outside or transporting alcohol across campus, and advised students to contact the DART team should they have any alcohol-related issues over the weekend. Although many RAs sent emails to their halls with similar warnings, the Worth email was circulated widely around campus by residents. The email stated that a member of the administration had told them there was “reason to believe that we should be extremely vigilant this weekend,” which led the RAs to write that they believed “we will likely be targeted this weekend.”

“It’s important that we comply and do these little things to keep each other safe… We don’t want to give the state police a reason to cite 30+ students,” the RAs stated in their e-mail. Despite fears to the contrary, no such “raids” occurred this weekend. However, two students were hospitalized showing symptoms of alcohol poisoning this past Friday, and both were cited for drinking while underage.