Buying alcohol for minors will mean the suspension of a driver?s license, if a Carroll County state delegate gets her way.
House of Delegates Deputy Whip Tanya Shewell recently introduced a bill that would suspend the driver?s licenses of those who buy alcohol for minors.
“The fines aren?t working so we needed to think about something that adults really care about it,” said Shewell, R-District 5-A.
First-time violators would have their license revoked for up to six months, and second-time offenders risk up to a year.
About 7 percent of youths obtain alcohol because they aren?t asked to show ID, while the remaining 93 percent get their booze from adults, Shewell said.
From 1994 to 2004, under-21, alcohol-related traffic fatalities for every 100,000 people in Maryland increased 35 percent, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
“It seems like in the past couple years, when one of the young people are impaired in crashes, it?s the adults who have furnished the alcohol,” said Shannon Oehlers, coordinator of Carroll Resources to Advance Safer Highways.
“Young drivers already run a higher risk of being in a crash, so when you add alcohol to the mix, chances are even worse,” Oehlers said.
A similar version of the bill failed last year because some legislators worried its language unfairly punished parents whose children get into their liquor cabinets.
But this year?s bill says adults have to knowingly give alcohol to minors before their licenses are suspended.
Fourteen legislators co-sponsored the new bill, including Del. Susan Krebs, R-District 9B, who said the current $1,000 fine isn?t working.
“Adults providing alcohol to minors is a huge problem,” Krebs said. “We need some type of significant deterrent to these individuals.”
