City of Columbia exploring new alcohol regulations

A Columbia commission is asking the city council to revisit its alcohol code.

The Substance Abuse Advisory Commission submitted a letter to the city council last Friday after reviewing a recent assessment report from the Responsible Hospitality Institute.

The reporthighlights several challenges the downtown area faces being surrounded by a college campus and filled with a variety of nightlife venues.

According to the report, “Among the nighttime challenges the city currently faces are incidents of violence, robbery, sexual assault, vandalism, crowd congestion, noise complaints, underage drinking, over-service of patrons, and impairment of both pedestrians and drivers.”

Molly Borgmeyer, Chair of the Substance Abuse Advisory Commission, said they would like to explore a few options that may help make Columbia a safer place for everyone to live.

“We’re really trying to start fresh and look at best practices nationwide, specifically within other college communities.”

Borgmeyer said the commission has been researching alcohol codes in other college towns such as Athens, GA and Gainesville, FL.

The possibilities for new city alcohol codes include alternative enforcement methods, implementing restrictions on drink specials as well as regulating the number of places that can serve alcohol within city limits.

“The goal right now is to open the conversation of policies that could be brought forward at some point and time to hopefully encourage a responsible consumption of alcohol,” Borgmeyer said. “We’re obviously not trying to eliminate the sell of alcohol, we’re not trying to eliminate the fun that occurs.”

The commission asked the Columbia Police Department to pull report numbers involving alcohol. The memo to city council shows reports involving alcohol have remained around 30 percent for the past three years.

Second Ward Councilman Michael Trapp said he’s in favor of exploring stricter city alcohol regulations to keep the city safe.

“Especially since we have an inadequate number of police officers. Anything that we can do on a policy level that is going to address public safety, I think we need to.”

Trapp said right now the city’s legal office is researching what alcohol regulations ordinances could be enacted in Columbia.