Last night, at ASMSU’s final general assembly meetings of the year, members passed a bill to allocate $57,000 towards the creation of the Safe Ride’s pilot program next fall in conjunction with a car transportation service that can't be named because of on-going negotiations. 

The Safe Ride Program is something that ASMSU has been working to implement for a over a year now, due to long negotiations with the company Uber and gaining endorsements from university officials, ASMSU vice president for finance and operations Greg Jackson said.

Jackson and ASMSU leadership is still in negotiations, and consequently cannot release many of the specifics for the Safe Ride Program, but Jackson assured ASMSU members that he and university officials were working to make the program best serve students.

Jackson said the pilot program should commence next fall, if negotiations go as planned. 

Aside from the Ride Share Program, ASMSU passed a resolution that calls for the repeal of Michigan’s Keg Tag law – a law that requires vendors to put a registration tag on each keg sold, in order to hold the buyer responsible if there is under-age drinking.

Mainly, members see the law as a deterrent from buying kegs, because students do not want to be held liable if under-age drinkers are present, and instead just buy hard liquor, which can be more dangerous for inexperienced drinkers.

ASMSU asserts that this law has accounted for an increase in hard liquor sales, especially on campus, and has contributed to a less safe drinking environment.

ASMSU leadership has been working with Olin Health Centers to compile statistics about the sales of hard liquor in the state and on campus in specific.

The sale of hard liquor, specifically in half-gallon form, has risen by four percent in Michigan since the Keg Tag law was enacted, as opposed to an average of one percent sales before the law, introducer of the resolution and ASMSU vice president for governmental affairs KC Perlberg said. 

Members also assert that the law has not been enforced, and even if an investigation occurs, it is difficult to prove that someone got drunk specifically from the keg that was registered. 

Perlberg said he has been in contact with state representatives in order to try and create legislation to repeal the current law.

Perlberg also said that repealing this law wouldn’t immediately change the statistics, but would be a first step in creating a safer drinking environment on campus.