Woman vows to keep pushing for keg registration law

A southeast Iowa woman who’s been pressing lawmakers to require tags on kegs to help track buyers who let minors drink the beer vows to continue her fight. Mary Krier of Ollie has been the adult leader of a group of students from Keokuk County who’ve been asking legislators for the past three years to require beer keg registration. “Last year our opponents were ready for us,” Krier says. “They cut us off at the knees.” Krier says the bill did not even make it into a committee this past legislative session. Krier blames House Republican Leader Chuck Gipp of Decorah for blocking it. “It just so happens that a large portion of his money that is donated for his race every two years comes from the opponents of this keg registration bill,” Krier says. Gipp denies Krier’s charge. Gipp says the “allegation” that he held up debate on the bill because of campaign contributions from beer distributors “is totally false.” Gipp says he held up the bill because he believes it would do little to reduce teen drinking. Gipp believes “any entrepreneurial young person” would just scratch the label off. “First and foremost, it’s illegal for people under the age of 21 to drink and have alcoholic beverages…so putting a penalty on for removing this (beer keg) label is breaking two laws,” Gipp says. “If you’re breaking the first one, obviously the second one isn’t going to be deterrent either.”Krier, who leads the Adolescent Alcohol Prevention Working Group, says putting tags on beer kegs would help cops track the adults who supply beer to underage drinkers and perhaps stop some from providing beer to minors. Gipp is still skeptical the move would reduce teen drinking. “Yea, right,” he says, laughing. “I was young as well.” Five Iowa counties now require local businesses that sell kegs to put a number on the kegs. Those five counties with beer keg registration ordinances are Hancock, Keokuk, Kossuth, Palo Alto and Poweshiek. Krier is a Keokuk County Supervisor and helped push through the local ordinance.”We have more and more counties coming on board with their own ordinances,” she says. “There are another five large, urban counties looking at it very seriously.”