Traffic Tech #254: Demonstration Completed On Smart Cards To Reduce Underage Drinking And Driving |
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Under a cooperative agreement, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), the Traffic Injury Research Foundation (TIRF) of Ontario, Canada, and the Bureau of Alcohol Education of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania conducted a demonstration and evaluation of the use of smart card technology to prevent the selling of alcohol to underage persons. The Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board enlisted CommStar, Inc. to develop the hardware and software for a simple, efficient, and reliable system for verifying the age of a customer, as well as the authenticity of the identification. Providing retailers and servers of alcohol with an easy-to-use means of determining a person's age has the potential to have a significant impact on sales of alcohol to minors and problems associated with underage drinking, including driving after drinking.
Three Pennsylvania Communities Participated
The MinorChecker(1) card reader system consists of a card reader, a microprocessor, and a small printer. It reads the magnetic stripe on the driver's license to determine the age of persons attempting to purchase alcohol. The demonstration was conducted in three Pennsylvania communities, York, Williamsport, and Altoona. About 60 licensed alcohol outlets in York received the devices. In addition, an education campaign on underage drinking directed at both licensees and youth accompanied the introduction of the readers. Williamsport received the same education program, but no MinorChecker units, and Altoona received neither the units nor the awareness campaign and served as the control site.
Evaluation Methods
The impact of the card reader system on access to alcohol by minors and the incidence of alcohol-related problems were examined over a period of up to 24 months. Various methods were used to compare alcohol sales to youth in the three areas, including compliance check operations, examination of traffic enforcement and crash data, focus groups, interviews, and analysis of the data collected through the card readers.
36,584 Cards Scanned
Over the course of the implementation period, 36,584 cards were scanned in York. The majority of drivers' licenses scanned were from Pennsylvania (95.7 percent) but licenses from 21 other states plus the province of Ontario were represented in the records. Almost half of all cards were scanned between 8 pm and 11 pm. Licenses indicating an age of 21 were the most frequently recorded (38.2 percent). Only 1.4 percent of records indicated someone under 21 years of age. Approximately 1.2 percent of records indicated an expired license, which is not considered to be a valid form of identification.
Focus Groups
Focus groups held with young people found a general fear of the card reader system, but they were determined to find a way to either avoid it or circumvent it. In general, they did not perceive the card reader system to be a significant barrier to their access to alcohol because they believed that retailers would not spend the money to obtain the device, or would not use it regularly because it would take too long to check cards, or would not check all cards.
Licensees were split in terms of their opinions about the value of the card reader system. One group was very enthusiastic about the system while the other remained skeptical. The first group immediately saw the potential benefits in their efforts to prevent sales to minors. The latter group thought the system was too expensive, unreliable, and redundant.
Compliance Checks
Young looking accomplices were hired to attempt to purchase alcohol in all three communities before the MinorChecker units were installed in York and again 18 months later, during the implementation phase. Prior to the implementation of the program, accomplices were able to purchase alcohol without being asked for ID on 16 percent of all attempts. Eighteen months later, they were able to purchase alcohol without being asked for ID on 48 percent of attempts. It was expected that there would be a systematic change in the approach to checking young patrons for ID after the awareness program and card checker system were implemented. Licensees were expected to ask young looking persons for ID more frequently. Clearly, this did not occur. In fact, following the implementation of the program, the rate of checking for ID actually decreased in York, as well as in the other two communities.
Single Vehicle Nighttime Crashes Decreased
The number of single vehicle nighttime (SVN) crashes is often used as a surrogate for alcohol involved traffic crashes. In York and Williamsport, the two program communities, SVN crashes among 16 to 20 year-olds decreased, while they actually increased in the control community, Altoona. These changes, however, were not statistically significant.
Alcohol-related Traffic Offenses Increased
Although it might be expected that the program would serve to reduce access to alcohol among youth and thereby reduce the likelihood of arrest for underage possession and drinking-driving offenses, charges actually increased in all three communities in the period after the implementation of the MinorChecker system. These increases are most likely attributable to increases in enforcement.
Summary
Even though some of the alcohol retailers in the study attested to the usefulness of the MinorChecker system in preventing underage drinking and driving, conclusive evidence of a positive impact of the implementation of the card reader system units was not a result of the demonstration. The researchers suggest that a more comprehensive program to reduce the availability of alcohol to underage youth may better demonstrate the value of the card reader system. Such a program would include universal implementation in a well-defined and geographically limited community, an awareness and educational program for servers and alcohol retailers, an awareness program for youth, and enhanced enforcement activities targeted at both youth and licensees.
HOW TO ORDER
For a copy of Using Smart Card Technology to Prevent Sales of Alcohol to Underage Persons (48 pages), prepared by Traffic Injury Research Foundation, contact the Office of Research and Traffic Records, NHTSA, NTS-32, 400 Seventh Street, S.W., Washington, DC 20590 or fax (202) 366-2746. Ellen Ross was the contract manager for this project.
U.S. Department
of Transportation
National Highway
Traffic Safety
Administration
400 Seventh Street, S.W. NTS-31
Washington, DC 20590
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