Drinking Arrests Up At Eastern Campus Police Chief Says More, Younger Students, Extra Officers Causing Increase

More Eastern Washington University students are getting into trouble on campus for alcohol-related incidents than ever before, officials say. In fact, 10 times as many EWU students were warned, arrested or even hospitalized for drinking alcohol on school grounds so far this school year than all of fall quarter last year.

University officials are not ready to call it a crisis, but they are sounding an alarm.

“I want to make it clear that we do not and will not treat underage drinking lightly,” EWU’s president, Steve Jordan, told the university board of trustees Oct. 27.

“We do not expect that EWU students will abstain from the use of alcohol, and we do not advocate a dry campus,” he said. “What we must expect is that all of us understand and live up to standards expected by the campus community and by the community that surrounds the university.”

And while residents of Cheney know that being neighbors with a university means dealing with some debauchery, even the police say the underage drinking is worse than before.

“This year is quite the party year,” Cheney Patrol officer Steve Kelly said. “There hasn’t been a party group like this for years.”

Jordan outlined his plan for curbing the escalating trend, which includes strict sanctions for students and training for university officials on how to deal with the problem.

Since fall quarter started Sept. 20, campus police have issued 70 warnings for drinking underage — called MIPs, for Minor in Possession. Last fall, police issued four warnings.

Alcohol-related citations, where the student is required to appear in court, are also up. This fall, nine students were cited with MIPs, drinking in public or furnishing alcohol to minors, compared to three last fall, and 15 for the 1999-2000 school year.

And two students have been hospitalized for drinking too much this fall quarter, compared to one last fall.

“It is a particular problem this year,” campus Police Chief Tom McGill said. “The reason why, I think, is because our enrollment is up and the average age of the student is down. We have 1,000 more underage kids this year than last.”

About 8,600 students are enrolled at EWU now, an all-time high for the state university. One third of the students are under 21.

The more underage students enrolled, McGill explained, the more who are likely to drink. Couple that with the addition of two officers to the five-man department this fall, and a new strategy of assigning each officer to a dorm, and the result is that more students are getting caught.

Policeman Mike Foster stewards Streeter Hall and is known for his vigorous enforcement practices. He has caught more underaged students drinking this year than any other EWU officer.

“You can usually smell it or hear them,” he said. “They’ll yell out something like, `Hey, pass me a beer.’ “

He said he tries to be conscientious of students’ privacy and will only investigate if he gets several indications, such as smell, sound of bottles and boisterous yelling.

A recent hire, he said he can’t compare the level of student drinking to previous years.

On Thursday last week, Foster helped with a presentation at Streeter on the consequences of underaged drinking hours before starting his graveyard shift. Making his rounds that night, the 6-foot-8 patrolman systematically padded through each floor, listening, smelling and chatting.

“Yo, Officer Foster, what’s up?” freshman Jillian Crisler yelled loudly when she saw him. She joked about how Foster was “putting the smack down” on students.

More seriously, she said she felt fewer students were drinking now than at the beginning of the quarter, although that was due as much to this week’s finals and the cold weather as to rigorous enforcement.

Even so, police were responding to incidents right to the end.

Just prior to Foster’s shift, officers issued a round of warnings to students in a Dressler Hall dorm room after a community adviser walked in and inadvertently saw beer.

Officers said the low-key incident was fairly typical — a room full of underage students drinking behind closed doors.

Streeter and Dressler are two of seven residence halls on the Cheney campus. All of them were filled to capacity this quarter.

Halls are supervised by a director and community advisers, otherwise known as CAs. The CAs, who are also students, are the front line of the university’s effort to confront unlawful or unruly student drinking on campus.

Like most other CAs, sophomore Genevieve Green has busted her share of underaged drinkers, she said. The problem is in part related to young students’ attitudes.

“Most of the people I talk to don’t feel like they are doing anything wrong,” Green said. “They are going to keep doing it because they feel it’s their right.”

Green and other CAs claim that there really isn’t much more drinking than in previous years. It only seems that way because more students are getting caught and held accountable for their actions.

CAs used to have more discretion and were typically lenient with students. CAs who saw underaged drinking might look the other way or just tell them to get rid of the booze.

Since 1999, however, the university’s new alcohol and drug policy gives CAs only one course of action: Call the director and the police.

First-time offenders typically get off with a warning, McGill said, but all students are sent to the dean of students for discipline.

Depending on the circumstances, Dean of Students Daniel Pugh said, punishment ranges from a warning, mandatory substance-abuse classes, suspension or expulsion.

“We are always focusing on the education of the students so the student will make future good decisions about alcohol use,” he said.

A new measure Jordan mandated is that all underaged drinking incidents are reported to the students’ parents.

Pugh said that Eastern’s surge of drinking incidents is still nowhere near as bad as at the University of Georgia, where he previously worked.

“I wouldn’t go so far as to call it an epidemic,” he said. “We know the numbers are up and that it’s happening with greater frequency. We need to get ahead of it.”

The university plans to do that with enforcement, volunteer health and safety workshops and by providing other activities as alternatives to drinking.

In the halls, for instance, CAs run double the workshops and activities they were required to run last year.

Pugh also said the problem is not related to fraternities and sororities. Most are now dry because of insurance requirements, he said.

Cheney police, however, say that while the Greek houses are dry, the members are not.

Many Greeks rent apartments or private houses, where they still host frequent parties, Kelly said.

“They’ve left the frats and gone other places,” he said. “It’s a bigger group than in years past, and they are mostly freshmen and sophomores.

“We don’t see a lot of seniors.”

The Cheney Police Department does not keep track of how many of the underage drinkers they deal with are students, Kelly said. Off-campus incidents are not included in the university’s statistics.

Anecdotally, Kelly said, most incidents Cheney police respond to involve students. He and many other Cheney residents take it as a fact of life in the small college town.

“We pretty much understand that there are going to be parties,” he said.

What the police try to do is to find a balance between letting students have fun while protecting residents’ rights, he said.

That means controlling the noise, vandalism and littering associated with drinking.

Mayor Amy Jo Sooy said Cheney enjoys a good relationship with the university and the Greeks. The problems associated with student drinking seem no worse than usual, she said.

“We are certainly always aware of it,” Sooy said. “It affects us, but no differently than any other public safety issue in the city.

“It’s just part of the university being here, and it’s not a daily occurrence.”