Maui law punishes property owners who host parties with underage drinkers

By ‘A’ali’i Dukelow

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    MAUI, Hawaii (KITV) — A new social ordinance on Maui that went into effect Wednesday holds any property owner accountable for hosting a party where attendees under the age of 21 are drinking alcohol.

According to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 30 percent of Maui County high school students currently drink alcohol, while the state average is 23 percent.

Meanwhile, 11 percent of high schoolers across the state reported binge drinking — Maui’s average is at 15 percent.

The Maui Coalition for Drug-Free Youth, an organization that helped launch the new law, surveyed about 450 high school students in 2018 — many of them said they saw fights break out and car crashes linked to house parties with underage drinkers.

“There was a really high number of people who said they knew somebody who had been sexually assaulted at a house party,” MCDFY coordinator Andrea Snow said.

19-year-old Jolee Correa said she “definitely heard of situations like that,” adding she often saw her high school classmates posting videos and pictures of themselves drinking in a home setting.

Now that she is in college, Correa said she notices even more underage drinking among her peers.

The issue hit close to home for Correa 5 years ago, when she said a drunk driver under the age of 21 almost killed her father and stepmother and injured her youngest brother.

“He was almost paralyzed from the neck down and he was three years old,” Correa recalled.

“That affected his life, for the rest of his life, cause he can’t play any contact sports that would put him at risk of being paralyzed due to his neck being injured.”

Correa hopes the new rule will help prevent young people from drinking, and its consequences, such as car crashes — and Snow believes it will because the ordinance is a civil penalty instead of a criminal one.

First-time offenders would face a $200 fine, $500 for a second violation, and $1,000 for a third.

“Folks don’t get a criminal record started, they don’t have a court date associated with this, it’s similar to a speeding ticket, which makes it really easy to enforce and creates a better deterrence for underage drinking,” Snow said.

A spokesperson from the Maui Police Department said officers can enforce the law when there’s a noise or disorderly conduct complaint about a party — or if they receive reports of underage drinking.

The rule does not apply to the islands of Moloka’i and Lana’i.

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