Iowa counties have found tracking kegs has produced positive results.

As the Story County Board of Supervisors takes aim at tackling a proposed keg ordinance this fall, an assessment of communities already enforcing similar laws poses to give ISU students the chance to understand the law’s effects.

Story County Attorney Steve Holmes proposed Ordinance No. 141 to the Board last spring, an ordinance that would allow kegs to be tracked by registration and documentation, sparking debate among the Ames and ISU communities. After changes to the ordinance, the process and debate to make the proposal a permanent law has restarted.

In 2002, Cedar Falls passed an ordinance that gives officers the ability to track the name and address of keg buyers.

Like ISU students, students at the University of Northern Iowa expressed their concern, but were not as vocal.

“I think right off the bat, students were a little apprehensive and didn’t know what to expect,” said Tarek Fahmy, vice president of UNI’s student government. “I think students thought it gave police access to parties officers didn’t have before.”

He said there was opposition, but there also miscommunication between students and city officials.

Public forums were held, but Fahmy was not sure how many students attended.

Cedar Falls Police Chief Rick Ahlstrom said specific circumstances prompted the new law.

“During homecoming in 2001, we had one convenience store sell over 80 kegs of beer,” he said. “When we found that out, we wanted to know where all the parties were going to be at.”

Now Cedar Falls police officers use the logs maintained by keg retailers to their advantage.

Ahlstrom said they check the logs before starting patrols and use the information in the logs as an evaluation tool so patrollers can get an idea of where parties will be occurring and in what numbers.

“[The ordinance] has just become a part of life. It’s definitely had an impact on those people throwing keg parties and who they allow to drink at those parties,” Fahmy said.

Mary Krier, Adolescent Alcohol Working Group chairwoman for Community Health Action Partnership said, “There seems to be a mindset in Iowa, especially in rural areas, that it’s OK for letting young people drink because then they won’t try other drugs – it’s a sort of right of passage.”

That allowance seemed to cause an inordinate amount of accidents involving underage drinkers, she said, and Keokuk County wanted to prevent anyone else from dying.

Krier said the community was very supportive of the idea and faced little opposition.

“If it saved one life, it was worth it. It may not stop the problem completely, but we did it to send a message,” she said. “It’s a tool for our law enforcement to ensure compliance because there has to be an adult that supplies that alcohol to underage drinkers.”

The effects on Keokuk County residents have been positive, Krier said. Fatal, alcohol-related accidents have decreased and more parents are reconsidering serving alcohol at graduation parties.

“I can understand that ISU students are concerned – I was young once, too, but underage drinking is illegal,” Krier said.

Keg ordinances can also have other effects, however.

Both Krier and Ahlstrom reported an increase in sales of other alcoholic beverages.

“We saw a decrease in the number of kegs being sold and an increase in the number of cans,” Ahlstrom said. “There’s no way of knowing how much [the ordinance] deters underage drinking. I do know how many tickets we’ve written but I don’t know how many tickets we haven’t written. There’s no way of quantifying that.”