Pubdate: Tuesday, 8 September, 1998 Source: Seattle Times (WA) Contact: http://www.seattletimes.com/ Author: Michelle Koidin, The Associated Press PARTY'S OVER FOR U.S. TEENS TRYING TO DRINK IN TIJUANA TIJUANA - American teenagers once loved this border city's neon-lit, disco-infused nightclub strip - a lawless playground that served up tequila shots and all-you-can-drink specials, no matter your age. These days, the party's coming to a sobering end. Public-health advocates, together with police on both sides of the border, are celebrating the first anniversary of their crackdown on border binge drinking, dubbed Operation Safe Crossing. While many San Diego-area college students - most too young to drink legally in California but old enough to get drunk in Mexico - still proclaim the Avenida Revolucion strip an ideal party destination, authorities are pleased with the progress they've made stopping high-schoolers. Because of ID checks at the U.S. border, fewer would-be partyers are heading to Revolucion's 30-odd bars and discos, which translates into fewer fights and fewer drunken drivers, officials say. About 20 percent fewer Americans are going to Tijuana to drink this year than last year, said James Baker, executive director of the San Diego-based Institute for Health Advocacy, an organization studying the problem. San Diego and state police have worked harder to enforce the law barring Americans under 18 from crossing the border without parental permission. On Friday night, the start of the Labor Day weekend, 99 minors were detained for trying to cross the border, and letters were sent to their parents. On Saturday night, 140 minors were denied entrance to Mexico. "When we went down a year-and-a-half ago, you could see 14- and 15-year-old American kids drinking," Baker said. "Now it's uncommon to see that, and that thrills me." More than 50 officers - federal, state and local police - kept drunk Americans on their way home from fighting or getting into their parked cars on the U.S. side of the border. On the Mexican side, Operation Safe Crossing entails keeping Americans under 18 - the legal drinking age in Mexico - out of bars by fining owners who allow them inside and by sending city inspectors from club to club for spot ID checks. That means some Americans end up showing their IDs three times: at the border, at the bar door and again inside. Authorities also persuaded bar owners to take down cheap-drink promotion signs. "Far fewer are going and far fewer are coming back intoxicated," San Diego police Capt. Adolfo Gonzales said. "Within the last year, we've seen fewer fights, fewer assaults, drastically fewer rapes." Tijuana bar employees can now take a course on how to recognize a fake American ID card. Over the summer, bartenders participated in workshops teaching them to refuse service to drunk patrons. "We have much more control now," said Arnulfo Palomera Hernandez, a program inspector. "With respect to the past year, we have 60 to 70 percent fewer minors in the bars." The new series of ID checks worked to stump three disappointed 17-year-old San Diego high-school girls on Friday night; while they managed to cross the border using fake IDs, they couldn't get into any of the discos. They still found a bar willing to serve them, however. "The cops let us in but the clubs won't," one girl in a drunken stupor complained. "The clubs are harder to get into than the border," another said, staggering. - --- Checked-by: Patrick Henry