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Some Greeks view crisis as turning point
By Elizabeth Mattern Clark | Monday October 17, 2005
Boulder Dirt
The rules are stricter, the parties smaller - and the alcohol harder - than when Jonathan Kelley joined a fraternity.
That was the 1980s.
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File photo
Hundreds attended this "Beer Blast" at the Acacia fraternity in 1979. Bands performed, and 17th Street was closed off between Aurora Avenue and Broadway. When 18-year-olds could legally drink 3.2 percent-alcohol beer, Greek parties were more in the open and less centered around hard alcohol, alumni say.
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The drinking age for 3.2 percent-alcohol beer was 18.
Fraternities threw "Beer Blasts" in Boulder streets, tapping kegs for hundreds of students in scenes that might now attract police in riot gear.
A string of lawsuits against fraternities, a new drinking age and increasing scrutiny of the Greek culture has held the groups to a stricter set of rules, said Kelley, a Theta Xi graduate of the University of Colorado and a member of the school's Alumni Inter-Fraternity Council. National fraternity officials have banned kegs in the off-campus houses, cracked down on hazing and developed rules for keeping parties under control.
Gatherings have gotten smaller, as Boulder police Chief Mark Beckner can attest.
"I think there are some attempts to not draw police or neighborhood attention, and we've seen fewer of the mega-parties," he said.
But fraternities are part of a college culture that's increasingly become centered around hard alcohol, Kelley said. That means when things do get out of control, they can get really out of control.
"When I was a freshman at CU, just about every freshman could drink legally, and they kept it more out in the open," Kelley said. "The biggest change I see is from the beer-and-wine-cooler type of drinking to the hard alcohol in the hands of youth, and that is obviously much more dangerous."
CU freshman Lynn Gordon "Gordie" Bailey Jr. died of alcohol poisoning last year after drinking whiskey and wine in a Chi Psi tradition.
Last week, Phi Kappa Tau's national leaders shut down their Boulder house for a series of violations. Several CU students were hospitalized for alcohol-related problems early Sept. 24 after attending University Hill parties, including those at Phi Kappa Tau or Sigma Pi.
Greeks could cease
The incidents have thrust the Greek system to a point of crisis, said Boulder fraternity spokesman Marc Stine. The Boulder chapters - which already lost recognition from CU after Bailey's death - could cease to exist if there's another major incident in a house, he said.
"If the city and university got together and decided they'd had it and said, 'Zero tolerance, no exceptions, send code enforcement, sanitation people, the fire department, write tickets for everything, no matter how small,' they'd drive us out of business in six months," Stine said.
"We'd be screaming police harassment, but we're not a sympathetic minority group."
He described today's Greek drinking scene as a microcosm of the college scene - and "worse than when 'Animal House' came out" in 1978.
Steve Hartman, CEO of the national Phi Kappa Tau fraternity, said the group's mission is focused around brotherhood, learning, ethical leadership and character. But too often the chapters simply "take the guy at the door" rather than students committed to those values.
Power shift
University officials used to oversee the Greek system as a stand-in parent.
In 1959, Dean of Students Arthur Kiendl put the Delta Tau Delta fraternity chapter on probation after a 200-person party at a Boulder Canyon lodge. Authorities reported finding several couples on four beds in a dark room at the lodge and "a large quantity of liquor and beer, some of it spilled on the floors, and a few students sick and vomiting," according to a Daily Camera article.
In the late 1960s, prompted by student protests, liability lawsuits and court rulings, colleges abandoned their supervisory role. Through their national headquarters and the student-run Inter-Fraternity Council, fraternities were essentially in charge of themselves.
That power shift came, though, as membership was dropping dramatically: The late-1960s youth counterculture labeled the Greek system as conformist and "irrelevant."
By the time membership soared again in the 1980s, the groups had lost their institutional memory of important traditions, said Stine, the fraternity spokesman. And there were no longer university officials in charge, leaving a void of adult oversight for the growing Greek membership.
"No one has held the chapters accountable," Stine said. "Up until this year, there's been nobody watching what the kids were doing who had any authority."
Alcohol-related deaths in 1985 and 1994 prompted lawsuits against CU, a sorority and a fraternity. In the past 15 years, at least nine Boulder fraternity chapters have been shuttered by their national chapters, including four since last fall.
Crisis changing frats
Some fraternity members say the Greek system is not so much at a crisis point as a turning point: Fraternities will either change to meet modern demands for accountability, or they'll be shut down and weeded out.
Sigma Phi Epsilon member Charles Johnson said his fraternity is an example of one that's a positive influence, with an increasing emphasis on philanthropy - or "binge giving" - and academics.
Sig Ep's Boulder house shut down after the March 1994 death of freshman Amanda MacDonald, who was crushed in a "car-surfing" crash on Flagstaff Road after a party. The chapter reopened 10 years later, committing to "break away completely" from the MacDonald tragedy and "never have an alcohol-related tragedy again."
The night last month when nine women were hospitalized for alcohol use, Sig Ep was holding an alcohol-free "Rock Against Rape" event with music and rape-prevention presentations, Johnson said. Five members sit on an alcohol committee convened by the chancellor.
"I think what's happening now actually highlights the individual fraternities and allows them to show that they can be an asset to the community," Johnson said.
"I don't think it's any greater of a crisis point than any other time. In many ways, it's a time for other fraternities to show that that's not what they're about."
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