Leaving Alcoholics Dry, Not High

For as long as he can remember, David Stansfield has serviced his alcohol habit at the downtown Long’s drugstore--buying everything from big plastic jugs of cheap vodka and long-necked bottles of beer to those thirst-quenching 22-ounce tallboy cans of malt liquor.

Then one day earlier this month, the 53-year-old homeless man known around town as “Doc” was told without warning that his money was no longer good at the bustling store a short walk from the Stanford campus.

With his liquor drinking and sometimes contrary ways, Stansfield had inadvertently joined the photo lineup of this town’s most unwanted, a motley collection of people whom police have identified, in color snapshots, as “problem drinkers and common drunkards.”

Palo Alto and neighboring Menlo Park are among a few Northern California cities that have launched aggressive--and controversial--programs aimed at controlling troublesome alcoholics. In each city, police have asked merchants not to sell alcohol to offenders whose pictures have been discreetly posted at local liquor outlets and convenience stores.

Authorities say that the practice--also begun this fall in nearby San Pablo--could become a vital new tool for communities across the state that have been forced to spend thousands of dollars each year in police and ambulance responses to deal with intoxicated street residents.

Using mug shots of the drinkers taken during recent arrests, police have asked store clerks to keep the “no sale” clutch of photographs from public view, but to consult them when offenders try to buy liquor.

Officers have also posted public warnings at area stores: “Don’t Purchase or Give Alcoholic Beverages to Habitual Drunkards,” the placards say.

Threatening a possible lawsuit, activists say that the pictures threaten the civil rights of buyers who--regardless of whether they are alcoholics--still have a right to purchase liquor.

Stansfield calls the practice a thinly disguised attack on the homeless. “After all these years, I finally can’t get a drink in this town, and that irritates me,” said the gray-haired former janitor, who for years has lived along the creek bed separating Palo Alto from Menlo Park.

“And why not? Because I’m poor, homeless and helpless.”

Greg Rothaus, a Menlo Park police patrol commander, said the program is not aimed solely at the homeless, but at anyone who meets the criteria of five alcohol-related contacts with police in the last year. Those contacts could range from having an open container in public to rowdiness or other infractions committed under the influence of alcohol.

“It doesn’t matter what a person’s income level is or their status in the community,” he said, “whether they live in a grand old house or down by the creek bed. What matters is the number of contacts with police.”

Two of the eight people included in Menlo Park’s lineup are unemployed men who live with their families, Rothaus added.

The photo lineup program is intended to help problem drinkers, not trample their civil rights, he said. “We’re not doing any favors for these drunks who constantly get ripped and arrested and sick,” Rothaus said.

“By allowing them to continue to purchase alcohol, we’re just acting as their enablers. Meanwhile, these people take police and ambulance time they can’t afford, and they tie up our paramedics.”

Several homeless men in Palo Alto disagreed.

“They’re not trying to help us, this is just flat-out harassment,” said Eric Brooks. “What about the business crowd and their five-martini lunches? I’ve seen Stanford college students stumbling down this street, screaming at the top of their lungs and walking right past these cops. Yeah, they’re trying to help us right out of town.”

Activists suggest the policy targets only the poor, saying that a check with the cities shows that most, if not all, of those listed are homeless.

“This is not a policy that’s applied across the board even though alcohol is a problem that affects all segments of society,” said Julia Greenfield, an attorney with the San Francisco-based Lawyer’s Committee for Civil Rights. “The bottom line is that there are valid statutes on the books to deal with intoxicated people who commit crimes or who pose a danger to themselves or others, but please, not this.”

Earlier this year, police in the wealthy community of Palm Desert circulated to local vendors pictures of half a dozen problem drinkers--asking that they not be served--but discontinued the program after pressure from activists.

The basis of the police policy in the three Northern California cities is a section of the state Business and Professions Code that prohibits the sale of alcohol to habitual drunks. But civil rights activists claim the practice is based on a section of the law that is so old and arcane that it is no longer legally valid.

City attorneys defending the practice call that claim ludicrous.

“The Constitution was written over 200 years ago--is that outdated as well?” asked Brian Libow, a city attorney in the East Bay city of San Pablo.

Greenfield is contacting each city about its policy and says that her organization might also seek a court injunction against the practice. “People who break the law should be put in jail, but don’t distribute their photos around town as public drunks--that’s not an appropriate response to the problem,” she said.

Menlo Park City Atty. Bill McClure stands by his city’s policy.

“Look, if someone believes there’s a problem, they should contact us and we’ll make a determination,” he said. “We don’t just stick our heads in the sand and ignore these issues.”

San Pablo Police Chief Douglas Krathwohl said his city’s program was started in October to battle growing problems caused by a cadre of local drunks who frequented the same liquor stores to cash their welfare and disability checks and immediately buy alcohol.

After consulting with lawyers, San Pablo police amended the city’s program to give a suspected problem drinker the benefit of the doubt: Before officers add an offender to the photo lineup, that person has an opportunity to rebut the charge of being a common drunkard, he said.

“We’ve put a lot of thought into developing a technique we believe could be used nationwide in problem areas where officers are well-informed and know who they’re accusing,” he said. “But you’ll never see a wholesale list, one that says, ‘These are all the drunks in town.’ That’s not our purpose.”

But at U-Save Liquor in San Pablo, co-owner Ching Hsieh showed a dozen sheets of paper with the names, pictures, dates of birth and other information of drinkers targeted by police.

“Do the police have the power to do this?” he asked.

In Palo Alto, Long’s manager Chris Lopez says that the program has already discouraged characters like Stansfield. He has watched them stumble into his store with liquor on their breath, panhandling and causing a commotion.

“His picture is on the list, so he doesn’t buy liquor here anymore, period,” he said. “I don’t care how long he’s been a customer.”

Although police say that the program is voluntary, some merchants say they have gone along with the program for fear of defying officers.

“These people don’t bother me,” said Hsieh, referring to a 12-picture lineup. “But I don’t want a confrontation with police, so I go along with it.”

Police in Palo Alto and Menlo Park recently held a meeting where agents from the state Alcoholic Beverage Commission explained that the vendors risked losing their licenses for repeated sales to problem drinkers.

Early one recent morning, Stansfield’s breath already smelled strongly of liquor as he sat on a city bench with his friends. For now, he and his friends say that they will beat the law by having someone not on the list buy their alcohol for them.

Still, they are offended by what they call a public humiliation.

“I’m a functioning alcoholic,” said a man named Scott. “I keep a job. I shave. I don’t stink. But when it’s cold and you’re homeless, you sometimes need a little vodka to get in a state of mind where it’s not so miserable. Now they want to take that away from us.”