Source: The Daily Californian, Saturday - Sunday,  March 13-14, 1999

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The Daily Californian
Border boozing
problem tackled

SDSU group, others urge moderation over spring break
By Carey B. Stone
Daily Californian staff writer
SAN DIEGO – Two years ago, Kelly Tharp planned to go to Baja California to spend her spring break with her best friend from high school. At the last minute, she decided to go elsewhere with other friends.

When she returned, Tharp learned her best friend had died in a drunken driving accident on his way back from a bar in Rosarito; she had arrived home just in time for his wake.

For Tharp, a senior at San Diego State University, it was a life-changing experience.

"I don’t drink any more," she said Friday. "I’m not into the (partying) scene. When I do go out, I’m the designated driver."

She has become active with Student to Student, a class and club on campus that promotes awareness of problems like drug and alcohol abuse. Sometimes she is angry that her friend lost his life from drinking and driving irresponsibly.

It was something that didn’t need to happen," she said. "Maybe if somebody had reached out to him it could have been different."

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A8 The Daily Californian Saturday-Sunday, March 13-14, 1999
BOOZE
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She conceded that he must have heard warnings about the dangers, but said, maybe it takes a personal experience for people to really listen to such warnings about drinking and driving.

With San Diego State’s spring break two weeks off, Tharp and Student to Student have joined U.S. and Mexican authorities in efforts to reduce binge drinking and fight the image of Baja California as a place for carefree hedonism and debauchery.

That image has been bolstered by the April issue of Playboy magazine, which calls Rosarito the "Supershot Spot" for spring break.

Tharp, Student to Student and others will distribute leaflets at the border and in Rosarito in an effort to educate young Americans about the physical and legal dangers of binge drinking and wild behavior in Baja California.

A riot involving 500 people broke out in Rosarito last spring, when 13 Americans were deported as a result. Drunken Americans are a common problem around spring break, Mexican authorities said, often engaging in raucous behaviors, such as having sex in public or throwing up on the street.
"What would we expect of students from Mexico who came to San Diego?" asked Josh Aull, president of Student to Student. "We wouldn’t tolerate them acting disrespectful and terrorizing the place."

Anthony Ramirez, a UC San Diego graduate student involved with the Institute for Health Advocacy, spoke of the unfortunate image many Americans have of Mexico and offered an alternative view.

"There’s a lack of respect for the customs and laws of Mexico," he said. "There’s an ‘anything goes’ attitude. It’s that image that a lot of students have of Mexico – a crazy place to just get drunk, be wild, and get naked."

Ramirez said he would "like them to see Mexico as a place with a lot of beautiful traditions, customs and tourist attractions. There’s great places to go hiking, camping, surfing, there’s lots of great ruins."

Baja California’s tourism department has begun to train bartenders and waiters to refuse more alcohol to those who appear drunk, said tourism official Jose de Jesus Quinonez. Last year, about 40 establishments in Tijuana received such training; this year bar and discotheque owners in Rosarito and Ensenada will be trained.

 
Mexican federal, state and local officials in Tijuana will work together to enforce their country’s laws. Students from the University of Baja California will had out fliers, informing visitors about the laws and the consequences they could face for breaking them – including up to 36 hours in jail and deportation, Quinonez said.

Bar owners who insist on sending brochures advertising Tijuana as a great place to get

drunk will have their licenses revoked, said Edgardo Campbell, who heads Tijuana’s equivalent of Alcohol Beverage Control. Street signs and banners advertising places to get drunk have also been banned in Tijuana, he said.

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