Flipping through the pages of The Pitt News last year, University of Pittsburgh students could read a feature called “Drink Specials” where prices of drinks at local bars were published by the newspaper, free of charge. The regularly published column was in response to a Pennsylvania law banning paid advertisements for alcohol in college newspapers. The Pitt News challenged the law, stating it lost $17,000 in advertisement sales when bars and restaurants were forced to stop advertising in the paper. Creators of the law tried to dodge a free speech challenge by banning only paid advertisements from the paper.

However, last July, a federal appeals court ruled the law unconstitutional, meaning the return of alcohol ads and the end of a feature titled “Drink Specials.”

While not a state law, the University of Wisconsin’s student newspapers have seen a notable drop in advertisements pertaining to alcohol. This trend started around a year ago after the Policy Alternatives Community and Education Project encouraged local establishments to cease advertising in student newspapers to combat high-risk binge drinking. Many bars and restaurant owners stopped advertising for fear of legal actions if they did not adhere to the suggestion. But the regulations on advertising have gone on long enough. An incalculable amount of money has already been lost in the time our student rags have gone with diminished advertisements for alcohol.

The independent paper is one of the few podiums students have to speak their mind without censorship and is of value to all on campus. An advantage to being independent of the university is that the paper is not censored, but if certain establishments are being pressured by PACE, a university-operated project, not to advertise in an independent publication, doesn’t that mean the independent paper is censored?

The ALRC recently began lifting drink special bans they encouraged local bars to adopt. Of like motivation, if the ALRC sees fit to lift these bans in the interest of local businesses, the body might too consider recommending that the advertising depression come to a swift end. UW students are exposed to numerous alcohol advertisements every day; the addition of these ads in the student newspapers is not going to transform anyone into a high-risk binge drinker. The Badger Herald, Isthmus, Daily Cardinal and The Onion are all available on the same rack in Van Hise Hall and nearly every other building on campus. Most people take one of each, two being alcohol-ad-free and two with more liquor ads than one can count.

Although the intentions of the PACE project are noble, sometimes the effects of their suggestions to local establishments are not properly calculated. Ending competition among alcohol venues by condemning ads in student newspapers hurts both local establishments and our independent newspapers.

Last year, many bars that were trying to tiptoe around the PACE project and ALRC were bombarded by a lawsuit from a law firm in Minneapolis. The actions of PACE are costing both the local bars and the students’ outlets for expressing their opinions.

If local establishments continue to not advertise in student publications, be sure to read a future column, “Drink Specials.”

Joanna Salmen ([email protected]) is a junior majoring in Spanish and journalism.