There is a correlation between student house-party locations and alcohol-related criminal incidents, according to data presented Thursday by the Community Taskforce on House Parties, but landlords and students say finding a way for safe student-run parties may be more complicated than that relationship.

The taskforce, organized by the Policy Alternatives Community Education Project, gathered data from a study conducted by PACE Project evaluator William Lugo. It used Geographic Information Systems mapping technology to show that areas with the greatest student density had the greatest number of alcohol-related incidents. These incidents include noise violations, vandalism, assault and battery.

According to the 2002 study, the College Park area, at the intersection of University Avenue and Gorham Street, and the 600 block of Langdon account for about one-third of all alcohol-related incidents during the weekend hours of 9 p.m. to 4 a.m.

“Even if you do make house parties safer, you still have other consequences the neighborhood faces,” Lugo said, referring to incidents of noise and vandalism.

Lugo said the goal of the study is to reduce high-risk drinking by learning what makes certain locations attractive for large house parties.

But the information does not demonstrate whether incidents in these areas are due to house parties or proximity to downtown bars. In addition, it counts numerous reports of the same incident individually.

Ald. Brenda Konkel, District 2, said house parties are generally a tenant’s right. There are no explicit tenant-landlord laws regarding house parties, she said, but landlords may include terms regarding alcohol or parties in their lease.

“If it’s in your lease and you signed it and you violated it, you can be evicted,” Konkel said.

Konkel said very few landlords address alcohol in their leases, but that some leases limit the number of guests a tenant may entertain. Many leases specify the tenant cannot be in violation of local law, which action could be taken if tenants exceed the legal capacity of their house or if the landlord notices an underage tenant with alcohol.

“As far as a landlord’s response, I can’t put [terms on alcohol and parties] in the lease because they are unreasonable and unenforceable. We would be going to apartments every weekend,” Steve Brown Apartments representative Tim Wadlington said.

According to Wadlington, landlords are property owners, deeply tied to their tenants’ house parties. Because they have a responsibility to police the neighbors of their properties and their residents, landlords are indeed liable for the consequences of house parties. Wadlington referred to daily occurrences of urination in elevators, destruction of exit signs, broken windows and a car totaled by a keg thrown from a seventh-floor porch as examples in which property owners need to have some control over the situation.

“As a landlord, you have a lot of involvement because alcohol affects every one of our residents,” Wadlington said.

According to Wadlington, Steve Brown Apartments ultimately decided to install security cameras in three of its larger buildings because of excessive property damage.

“[Incidents] came to a screeching halt because of the cameras. As a bottom line to me, I was protecting my residents,” he said.

University of Wisconsin senior Joe Crain said that the taskforce is making progress, but determining where the incidents occur isn’t the solution. According to Crain, students who violate the law don’t always live in areas with elevated instances of alcohol-related crimes.

“I’m hoping that a committee of students can work with police on these issues to observe these parties or work with police in other ways to solve these problems,” Crain said.

The taskforce will hear law enforcement’s approach to house parties in March and continue discussing strategies for hosting safer house parties.