By: Doug Miller
According to the new law, all kegs retailers must collect an additional $75 deposit on top of all other deposits, taxes and fees. In addition, the name of the person renting the keg is printed on a tag and attached to the keg. If the keg is returned without the label, the renter is issued a fine of up to $500.
The idea is to create a paper trail for police officers, who in Nassau County typically stumble on keg parties in basements, forests and beaches only to helplessly watch dozens of teenagers flee the scene, leaving the keg behind. Typically, the price of freedom for these teenagers is the $10 keg deposit and a $30 tap deposit.
The result is that police officials are left to take care of the abandoned kegs. In Long Beach, police said that in previous summers their property room would be filled on any given day with a half-dozen abandoned kegs that they had recovered from parties of underage drinkers.
Since the law went into effect in November, that number has held steady at zero, "but ask me again after the Fourth of July," said Police Commissioner Thomas Sofield Sr.
While several Nassau communities are plagued by underage drinking at house parties, Long Beach's topography makes beach drinking a natural fit. "They would buy them outside of Long Beach and transfer them to the beach," said Sofield. "Often, they bury them. There they have their privacy and no parents. And it's easier to run away when the police come."
Long Beach's five miles of beach are regularly patrolled by police officers, auxiliaries and specials, but keeping up with the college kids is tricky.
The idea is to cut off supply. But what the law is doing, several retailers said, is driving the demand to bottles and cans, which are unregulated and, some say, far easier for teenagers to obtain.
To understand the law, it helps to know the history. As big a problem as underage drinking is in Nassau County, it's a nightmare in Westchester County, where the kids are even richer and the parents seemingly invisible. The county's district attorney, Jean Pirro, began pushing for the law after a series of alcohol-related teen fatalities, and in November it became a reality.
But New York's State Liquor Authority has only five field offices, none on Long Island, and there is no enforcement apparatus in place. Several Herald reporters began asking about the law in May and were met with blank stares and shrugs by retailers, law-enforcement officials and even judges and D.A.s.
Ali Faisal, manager of Westbury Beverage Incorporated, said he had not heard of the law. Faisal acknowledged that many minors try to purchase kegs from him, and that he doesn't have any policies aimed specifically at deterring underage drinkers. "We don't have written policies, but we don't sell to minors and we always check identification," he said. "Sometimes younger people try, but we don't sell to them."
Faisal said that police periodically check in to make sure no illegal activity is taking place. "Cops are in once a month," he said. "They stand outside and they check."
As for how many kegs the store sells on average, Faisal says it varies, with sales peaking around holidays. "It depends on the day. We're going to sell a lot of kegs on July Fourth and we sold a lot on Father's Day, but on average we sell about three or four kegs a week on average," he said.
At Valley Stream Beverage on Franklin Avenue, a man who said he was a manager but would only give his first name, Michael, said the state had never bothered to inform the very people the law was meant to regulate. "We found out [about the law] from one of our wholesalers," said Michael. "The state never said anything. They never even supplied us with the forms.
"Even before this law, if [someone] came in [for a keg] we used to write their license plate number on the receipt, so at least we covered ourselves."
The manager of an Oceanside beverage distributor, who asked that the store not be identified, said that the business decided to forego the keg business completely because of the new laws.
"We just don't sell them altogether," said the manager. "Kids would come in and have someone who is 21 buy it, and it would wind up at a party with underage kids. It just wasn't worth it."
The manager said that the law is a good one, and although it hurts the business owner, there are ways around it. "Absolutely, it's a good law -- there's so much underage drinking. They make it so hard for the business owner, between the rentals and the laws, it's just easier not to sell the kegs at all. If that's what the state wants to do, then they're doing a good job."
In Long Beach's rowdy West End, where each street is shut down once a year in an endless round robin of block parties, the employees of West Beech Beverage said they only heard about the law after reading about it in a trade paper. Despite their location in the heart of the West End, manager Rob Blumenthal told the Herald, they had sold a total of perhaps a dozen kegs since the law went into effect.
"No kid has $200 they can just [throw] away," Blumenthal said, "and no one is stupid enough to voluntarily put their name on the keg. But does the law really work on the college kids? No. They can just go out and buy five 30-packs, which is the same thing."
So where are all those underage drinkers buying the 30-packs? Mike Sobol, the owner of Sobol Beverages in Inwood and a member of the board of the Empire State Beer Distributors Association, called the law a misguided attempt at politics that fails to nab the real purveyors of alcohol to minors: convenience stores and gas stations.
There are 450 licensed beer distributors in New York that belong to his organization, which represents retailers from Buffalo to Montauk that sell kegs. "In 2003, [association members] received four citations for selling alcohol to minors," Sobol said. "Those other markets -- convenience stores, gas stations and the like -- received more than 2,000 citations. Selling alcohol should be a privilege.
"My organization supports any legislation that prevents DWIs and prevents kids from drinking, but this is a band-aid on a much bigger wound," he said. "Kids know they can just go to the local gas station with $30."
Additional reporting by Nicole Falco, Angela Marshall, Scott Brinton and Jason Scheer.
