Putting MAPs in Context
The Issue:
Legislation affecting alcohol consumption is generally believed to be within the jurisdiction of the federal and provincial governments. Local communities can, however, control where and how alcohol is consumed in municipally owned recreation facilities and parks.
While most drinking in Ontario is done at home and in commercial establishments, a considerable amount of alcohol is consumed at specially licensed permit functions. These single occasion permits functions are granted by the Liquor Licence Board of Ontario for events such as banquets, weddings, festivals, sporting events, dances and charitable fund raising projects. Approximately 156,000 special occasion permits (SOP's) are issued annually in Ontario. Many of these alcohol involved functions are hosted in municipally owned recreation facilities.
Well intentioned, but untrained volunteers frequently manage these one time drinking events. As a result, problems pertaining to underage drinking, drunkenness, rowdy behaviour and impaired driving are not an uncommon occurrence. Civil liability has become an issue as a result of these negative behaviours. While most civil liability cases tend to be directed at privately owned establishments like bars and taverns, municipalities are no longer exempt.
The seriousness of the problems associated with special occasion events and the threat of civil liability have led many municipalities to introduce alcohol risk management policies.
Municipal Alcohol Policies (MAPs)
Alcohol policy at the municipal level generally takes two forms: the introduction of alcohol risk management policies and limiting the number of alcohol outlets in the community.
Many communities in Ontario have implemented alcohol risk management policies in an attempt to reduce problems related to alcohol use. Risk management policies regulate the use of alcohol in municipally owned or regulated facilities and outdoor recreational areas where alcohol may be served at specially licensed social and recreational events. Such events are usually operated by inexperienced volunteers who, at times, serve participants to intoxication. This contributes to vandalism, fights injuries, and impaired driving. Such occurrences not only often result in criminal charges or license suspensions, but also entail costs in terms of police time and litigation.
Throughout the 1990's the Addiction Research Foundation and local Public Health Units have facilitated the development and adoption of Municipal Alcohol Policies (MAPs) in a large number of Ontario communities. MAPs have generally come to include a common set of regulations and recommended management practices.
Most MAPs call for preparation of a list of facilities at which alcohol can be served and at which alcohol cannot be served; restrictions on serving patrons to intoxication; provision of safe transportation for the intoxicated; prohibiting the serving of alcohol to underage participants; and making available low alcohol drinks and food. Management practices include adequate door and floor supervision; limiting the number of drinks that can be purchased at one time; serving drinks in paper cups; and requiring SIP training for people operating, supervising and serving at alcohol-related events. Compulsory server training programs have been shown to be successful in increasing both servers' knowledge about their obligations and the strategies they can use to prevent serving customers to intoxication while increasing their repertoire of appropriate responses to the intoxicated. (Gliksman et al., 1993a)
By the beginning of 1995 at least l62 municipalities in Ontario had a MAP in place or in development. The majority of the communities have noticed few changes in the rentals of their facilities, but have noticed reductions in problems associated with alcohol use including underage drinking, fighting and vandalism. (Gliksman, Douglas, Rylett and Narbonne-Fortin, in press)
Reducing the Number of Alcohol Outlets
The second way municipalities can attempt to influence consumption and, therefore, the extent of alcohol-related problems in the community is by preventing an increase in alcohol outlets, regulating the behaviour of current outlets and even closing existing outlets.
This policy approach is based on a series of studies which has investigated the relationship between outlet density and alcohol use or alcohol-related problems. For example, a study by Gruenewald, Ponicki and Holder (1993) concluded that higher density of alcohol outlets led to an increase in consumption. Another study by van Oers and Garretsen (1993) found significant relationships between the density of liquor outlets and the rates of traffic injuries in neighbourhoods.
Communities must be involved in developing and implementing this kind of policy strategy taking into account local needs and conditions. At a more general level, though, a set of guidelines delineating the process does exist.(Wittman, 1986) These include:
- local mapping of alcohol outlets and alcohol-involved problems (this includes looking at outlets in terms of geographic density, populations density, commercial density, capacity, and mix of outlets as well as the identification of problem outlets)
- establishment of a community process to develop a local alcohol and access plant to reduce alcohol-involved trauma
- completion of a local alcohol access plan which will include recommendations about possible use of local zoning and land-use planning
- establishment of a community process (e.g., a community forum) to present and discuss the local plan; and,
- establishment of an on-going communications process to inform the community about alcohol availability in the context of alcohol- related problems.
References
DePape, E. & Leonard, M. & Pollett, G. & Heughan, D. Health benefits of municipal alcohol policy: A role for public health. Public Health & Epidemiology Report Ontario 6(10) October: 262-265.
Douglas, R.R., Pyette, S. & Anstice, J. (1990). Tehkummah's alcohol management policy: A model policy that may help reduce risks associated with SOP functions. Municipal World 17, Fall. pp. 14-18.
Else, P., Douglas, R.R. & Becks B. (1992) Responding to the challenge: Reducing problems through municipal policy development. Public Health & Epidemiology Report Ontario 20, November, pp. 348-50.
Gliksman, L., Douglas R., Rylett, M. & Narbonne-Fortin, C. (In press). Reducing problems through municipal alcohol policies: The Canadian experiment in Ontario.
Gliksman, L., McKenzie, D., Single, E., Douglas, R., Brunet, S. & Moffatt, K. (1993). The role of alcohol providers in prevention: An evaluation of a server intervention programme. Addiction 88, pp. 1195-1203.
Narbonne-Fortin, C. & Lauzon, R. & Douglas, R.R. (In press) Municipal alcohol policies: reducing alcohol-related harm in Ontario communities. In New Public Health Policies and Programs for the Reduction of Drug Related Harm. P. Erickson, D.M. Riley, Y.W. Cheung, P.A. O'Hare (eds.) Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
Pollard, A., Abraham, T. & Douglas, R.R. (1989). Avoiding litigation: Elliot Lakes alcohol management policy. Recreation Canada 47, December, pp. 12-18.
Prevention Research Center (1992). General Action Plan for A National Community Prevention Trial to Reduce Alcohol-Involved Accidental Injury and Death. Prevention Research Center, Berkeley.
Symons, K. & Douglas, R.R. (1991). Community policing in action: Controlling special occasion permit drinking events. The OPP, Review 26, March, pp. 6-8.