The state Board of Regents has appointed a task force to look at potentially allowing beer and wine to be sold at campus events for the state's six public universities.
Janelle Toman is the director of communications for the board of regents. She says the task force is in its early stages of discussions about allowing alcohol to be sold during events such as sporting games and fine art performances.
“There are six campuses with their representatives sitting around the table in this conversation and based on our first meeting, it appears to me each one has a bit of a different perspective on it. Some have more interest on it than others, I don’t think anyone is saying that wouldn’t consider it, but they want to know more first before they would go down that route. Others are more interested in it for very narrow uses,” says Toman.
Toman says the task force is looking at the impact the change could have across the state.
“Is this a revenue generator, does it generate revenue and if so, is that important to us. Another issue we’re looking at, is this a way to manage risk? If you control your services you tend to control your risk, so is that a positive and negative. And obviously the last thing we look at is whether or not this enhances an event for people of legal age,” says Toman.
The taskforce is presenting their finding at the Board of Regents meeting in December. From there Toman says the board could move forward with a proposal, or recommend the task force do further research.
“So I’m sure there are some people who hope we can go to the 2016 legislature with a proposed bill. I’m not prepared to say we can’t, but it might be a little quick to get there that quickly. Plus we would have to look at a series of board level policy changes along with the state law change,” says Toman.
The proposal to form the task force was brought to the board in October by the council of presidents made up of members from all six public universities.