Advertisement - Click to support our sponsors.

Scanners may curb
underage drinking

Driver's licenses would be encoded
with the person's birthdate

---

By Leila Fujimori
Star-Bulletin

A Mothers Against Drunk Driving youth conference has proposed using electronic scanners to curb underage drinking.

The National MADD Youth Summit to Prevent Underage Drinking is suggesting that magnetic strips and/or bar codes encoded with a person's birthdate be used on driver's licenses and identification cards and that bars and places that sell alcohol use scanners to read the cards.

Two Hawaii teen delegates shared the recommendations from the summit at a town hall meeting held in Honolulu yesterday.

Delegates Tiare Costa-Puaa and Tiffany Chan joined parents, police officers, educators, health and transportation officials, judges, church leaders and the media to explore ways Hawaii can stop youth alcohol use.

"Underage drinking is one of Hawaii's most pervasive problems, causing death and injury to far too many young people each year," said first lady Vicky Cayetano, who hosted the interactive discussion held at Washington Place.

Teens from across the country worked with legislators, law enforcement, federal agencies, the media and researchers at the Washington, D.C. summit to come up with ways to curb the problem.

Other recommendations included:

Increasing the excise tax on alcoholic beverages to fund alcohol awareness and prevention programs.

A federally funded national media campaign for the prevention of underage drinking.

Restrictions prohibiting alcohol ads from airing prior to 10 p.m.

Anti-alcohol ads paid by the industry and/or funds received from excise taxes to counter every alcohol ad aired.

MADD will host additional town hall meetings across the state to address the problem.