Should the drinking age be lowered?

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Don’t be expecting Jerry Corcoran, president of Illinois Valley Community College, to join the Amethyst Initiative. “You won’t see my name on that list,” Corcoran said Monday. The subject of how old people should be in order to legally purchase and consume alcohol is back in the forefront due to the Amethyst Initiative.

As part of the Amethyst Initiative, 128 college and university presidents have signed a statement calling for “an informed and dispassionate” debate regarding lowering the drinking age from 21.

In 1984 Congress passed the National Minimum Drinking Age Act, which imposed a penalty of 10 percent of a state’s federal highway appropriation on any state setting its drinking age lower than 21.

According to a statement released by the group, “Adults under 21 are deemed capable of voting, signing contracts, serving on juries and enlisting in the military, but are told they are not mature enough to have a beer.”

Corcoran applauded those college presidents who were not afraid to speak out and echoed their concerns about binge drinking, but he said he didn’t agree with the statement.

“We should leave well enough alone and focus on education,” he said. “We have more important things to do.”

Corcoran is not alone. Many area residents who deal with teens and drinking also oppose the idea of lowering the drinking age.

Bureau County Sheriff John Thompson said the idea is not a good one. Thompson said that if the legal drinking age was lowered to 20, there would be more drinking-related accidents, and if it was lowered to 18 or 19, there would be even more.

“With all due respect to the military and our young adults, a good portion of that population is not mature enough for this,” he said.

Thompson said he didn’t want to sound condescending to young adults, but he was not in favor of lowering the age.

“I am not going to support reducing the drinking age because it would only hurt our young adults,” he said.

Aimee Stoller, guidance counselor at Bureau Valley High School, agreed.

“I just think that lowering the drinking age would be a step in the wrong direction,” she said.

Stoller said many teens already drive recklessly, so she would have a concern about them drinking and driving.

“It would cause greater problems down the road,” she said.

Claudia Bachman, prevention specialist with North Central Behavioral Health Systems, also opposes lowering the drinking age.

“I can’t believe that politicians would be considering this,” she said.

Bachman said the statistics show the lower the drinking age, the higher the number of fatalities.

“Also, the lower the age at the onset of drinking, the greater the incidence of addiction in later years,” she said.

Bachman said she was definitely not in favor of lowering the drinking age.

“It would bring a whole host of more problems locally, statewide and nationally,” she said.