Game days at Autzen Stadium are not only known as opportunities to cheer on the Ducks, but also for the widespead opportunity to attend tailgate parties, which often sell or provide beer and alcohol.
But what is not well known is that drinking in any parking lot besides the stadium’s is illegal. The inability of the Eugene Police Department to enforce those laws has prompted police and city officials to review alcohol enforcement, which may involve changes to policies regarding alcohol on the University’s Autzen property.
In a Monday work session, the Eugene City Council decided to look at drafting an ordinance that would require property owners and managers to get permits that would allow alcohol drinking in their pay-for-use lots. They discussed the area around Autzen as a problem area, but did not mention any other specifics as to areas that would be covered by an ordinance.
The new ordinance would put greater responsibility on the owners and managers of the pay-for-use lots to monitor drinking and behavior and on the city to review and issue permits.
Police Capt. Pete Kerns said as parking has become less available at Autzen, the tailgating parties have moved into the surrounding lots, which are rented out as space by non-profit organizations. The lack of police staff has made it difficult to deal with the liquor violations and alcohol-related violence and disputes.
“On game days, there’s virtually no enforcement for what is, without any question, the largest gathering of unregulated drinking in the city on any given day a year,” Kerns said. “The police department doesn’t have the capacity to address those violations, even if we wanted to.”
Autzen Stadium is exempt from the law because of a 1983 ordinance that permits alcohol drinking in the Autzen parking lot for four hours before and two hours after the games.
Nevertheless, the permit option would look at seeing if the city could make the University, a state entity, acquire liquor permits for the Autzen parking lot. Kerns said the issue was brought up because of equity concerns over making property owners get alcohol permits.
“If private property owners neighboring Autzen have to have one of these permits, they’d like it if the UO also had to have one for Autzen,” Kerns said.
Dan Williams, the assistant to the president for Intercollegiate Athletics, said he would wait to see how the issue plays out. He said an ordinance requiring the University to apply for a permit wouldn’t necessarily be fair since the University has managed to do what was required of them under the exemption.
“Since we received the exemption, we’ve lived up to the city expectations to manage alcohol consumption and liquor control,” Williams said. “If an ordinance affects the University in any way, we’ll certainly take the opportunity to get involved and comment.”
In case the permit plan does not work out, the council opted for a second option, where city staff would develop an amendment that would allow liquor consumption in an expanded area around Autzen. The option would eliminate the question of equal enforcement, and it would have no financial costs, although it would not address alcohol-related problems, according to city documents.
Kerns said the choice is up to the city council, although the police want an option that can help manage disorderly conduct and control liquor use.
“What the police department want is they want the conditions around the stadium to be safe,” Kerns said. “Whichever option accomplishes that and also accomplishes the other interests that the city council has around this is a good one for us.”
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