Addicted to Alcoholic Beverages? - Move to Wisconsin

Four members of an OWI task force tasked with figuring out how to reduce DUI deaths in WI quit because they say the Tavern League of WI has too much clout, so that no serious measures to curb drunk driving were proposed. Also, below, is a collection of articles explaining the drinking situation in Wisconsin.

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Four Wisconsin OWI task force members quit saying that the Tavern League of Wisconsin has too much clout with the Dept of Transportation. The task force report says that 75% of deadly DUIs involve first time offenders, yet WI has no intention of making first offense DUIs a felony:

http://www.jsonline.com/news/statepolitics/four-wisconsin-owi-task-force-members-quit-b99285141z1-262006681.html

Two doctors and two other health officials quit a state drunken driving task force Thursday....

Wisconsin...is the only one that does not treat first offense drunken driving as a crime.

Their letter criticized the DOT for developing a plan in collaboration with a group that lobbies for tavern owners and relies on alcohol industry sources in some cases.
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Wisconsin's drunk driving deaths bad enough to require a task force plan, or else it would lose federal highway safety funding:

http://media.jrn.com/documents/WI+Statewide+Impaired+Driving+Plan.pdf

Fully 75% of alcohol-related crashes resulting in fatal and serious injuries cra
shes involved a first-time offender.

Wisconsin’s average impaired driving fatality rate for the prior three years is 0.38, which makes Wisconsin a “mid-range state.” As with other mid-range states, Wisconsin was required to submit either a statewide impaired driving plan that was developed by a statewide task force within the three years prior...
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Tavern League in Wisconsin is the most effective lobby in Wisconsin, getting its way a higher percentage of the time than even the teachers union, or the Manufacturers. Bar owners enjoy unprecedented access to WI politicians because half of all fund-raising events are held in bars and liquor serving restaurants. As a consequence, WI has the laxest drunk driving laws in the nation, and the beer tax is only $2 per barrel:

http://www.jsonline.com/news/wisconsin/32070754.html

Between January and mid-September, about half of the more than 240 fund-raising events for Capitol politicians were held in taverns and restaurants with liquor licenses. That gives tavern operators an opportunity to interact with legislators on their home turf - an advantage that groups such as the state's nurses or prison guards don't enjoy.

The state hasn't raised the $2-per-barrel tax on beer since 1969. It's the third lowest in the nation. In the halls of the Capitol, the tax is considered untouchable.
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Wisconsin is the number one drinking state in percentage of binge drinkers:

http://www.jsonline.com/news/wisconsin/30903834.html

Milwaukee Journal-Sentinal Special Section on WI Drunk Driving (check out the "Wasted in Wisconsin" graphic which shows the state of WI as a beer mug with a head of foam):
http://www.jsonline.com/news/30565984.html
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WI residents on average consume over one barrel of beer per year (31 gallons),
but that's less than the average in places like Montana, Nevada and N Dakota. WI's beer tax rate is 48th lowest in the nation:

http://finance.townhall.com/columnists/politicalcalculations/2012/03/11/beer_taxes_by_state
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Wisconsin counts the fourth drunk driving offenses as a felony only if a prior DUI conviction was within 5 years. Thus, it is not uncommon to read of older people being arrested for their 8th or 9th DUI who haven't served any time ever, and even their latest DUI arrest might only be a misdeamor:

http://www.madd.org/laws/law-overview/DUI_Felony_Overview.pdf

Just 70 defendants, or 43%, went to prison, receiving an average sentence of 18
months. Seventeen of those had an opportunity to shave substantial time off their
sentences by completing boot camp or a treatment program. At least one defendant got out early after petitioning the judge.

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Look this up in the Mequon library. I am sure it is unread.

GJ - I can name four WELS clergy, one of them a DP, with DUI/OWI charges. Selling drugs in school? No problem in Wisconsin/WELS. But thinking outside the Holy Mother Synod box? - felony. Excommunicatio. Anathema sit!

Sig Becker was appalled by the amount of drunkenness and adultery in the WELS clergy. But they took their UOJ seriously - everyone is forgiven, even for future sins.

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Ah, Wisconsin and its drinking laws.

Back in the mid to late 1970's, states all over the Great Lakes regions dropped the drinking age (for any type of alcohol, not just 3.2 beer) to 18.  Dropping the age to 18 allowed alcohol to flow like water through the high schools (many seniors were 18 during their senior year in school; the booze "trickled down" all the way to the freshman class depending on a person's "connections").

The states fairly quickly realized their mistake....for a very short period, I was "legal" for alcohol, but by 1979 the age went back up to 21 in the state I lived in.

I knew some people from my same class that were going to a certain small religious college that no longer exists in Wisconsin.  Wisconsin did not raise their drinking age, at least for beer during this time.  I think Wisconsin finally followed along when they were threatened with losing Federal tax dollars for roads and highways. 

I was told in all seriousness by my ex-classmates that in Wisconsin "they knew how to handle their drinking".  Sure.....

I was turned off to drinking by what I saw in high school, and have stayed pretty much a teetotaler (I have no religious convictions not to drink; it's just not something I ever have felt the need to do).

To each his own, I guess.

Grumps