Serve Alcohol Responsibly --Or Don’t Serve It At All

> It is no secret that the great majority of our more than 1,700 Moose Centers across North America have Social Quarters operations, willing to sell a bottle of beer, a glass of wine or a mixed drink to its members in good standing, all of whom must be 21 or over.

So it would be ludicrous (not to mention highly hypocritical) for any Director General of the Moose to issue some sort of moralizing statement on the evils of serving alcoholic beverages. And I’m certainly not going to.

What I will do (and what I have done for all my years as a leader of this organization) is say that it is (and has always been) dangerous and wrong to serve anything other than a soft drink or cup of coffee over the bar of a Moose Social Quarters to any member who shows any sign of already being intoxicated. Moreover, it is (and always has been) wrong for a Moose server to ignore the fact that an intoxicated person was leaving the building to get behind the wheel of an automobile; it has always been his or her duty to do whatever reasonably could be done to ensure that person was driven home by a sober person.

All of this has always been just basic human decency and common sense.

What’s different in 2007 is that your Lodge’s very ability to continue doing business depends on that common sense--as well as demonstrating and documenting it.

It’s become a trend, in the last few years, that anywhere in North America, anytime there has been a alcohol-related accident where the at-fault driver has consumed even one drink in a Moose Center, that facility and Moose International have been named as defendants in a lawsuit.

In just the last few years, juries have been making larger and larger awards to plaintiffs against liquor-serving establishments, such that it is becoming very difficult--indeed, approaching impossible--to obtain necessary liquor-liability insurance.

Just this past year, the Lodges’ self-insured retention amount (comparable to a home- or car-insurance deductible) for each loss in liability cases has had to triple. That’s three times the amount of your money--paid out to a family whose loved one was hurt or killed by a driver, whom a plaintiff’s lawyer was able to prove was served even one drink in a Moose Center Social Quarters.

And THAT is why the Supreme Council, this past November, ordered General Governor David Chambers to take a very unpopular but unfortunately very necessary step:

Chambers was instructed to suspend the Social Quarters permit of any and every Moose Center that has not yet documented that all of its beverage servers have completed a recognized server-training program, teaching the basics of recognizing intoxication, and the steps to take to ensure that an intoxicated patron does not drive away from the facility. As of early January, roughly 100 of our Moose Centers had not yet documented that they were in compliance--though the General Governor and Director of Risk Management Brad Costello have stressed the necessity of this training for more than a decade, and it has been absolutely required (with full notification) as of fall 2005. For more information, contact Brad at bcostello@mooseintl.org, or 1-800/544-4407.

Your Lodge has no choice but to vigorously enforce server training in our Moose Centers. Without it, Moose Centers will simply no longer be able to get liability insurance coverage at all. If you’re not an officer, just a member who enjoys a beer in a Moose Social Quarters, don’t be offended or upset if the server errs on the side of caution, and says “no more.” He’s just doing his job--the way he must.