The joint UI and Iowa City group created to address excessive drinking among students will hold a meeting late next week to discuss exactly what the school is doing about the issue.

The Partnership for Alcohol Safety will talk about the increased presence downtown of the UI police, bystander-training efforts, and a new East Side Safe Ride loop, among other issues, said UI spokesman Tom Moore.

“We know there is intense interest, and we wanted to provide and update as to where we are now,” he said. “Hopefully, this will be an opportunity to lay it all out.”

Moore said the group will also discuss the UI’s and Iowa City’s collaborative efforts as well as future plans.

Speakers will include Iowa City Mayor Regina Bailey and UI Provost Wallace Loh, who heads the 23-person Alcohol Steering Committee, and other members of the Partnership for Alcohol Safety.

The idea to issue the UI’s information in a single setting came from Mary Stier, who was hired in January as a consultant to create an anti-binge drinking plan. The appointment lasted for seven months and she was paid $25,000.

Stier said she has since finished her consulting work and handed it over to the UI. She described it as a fact-finding mission and said she spoke with various students, faculty, staff and community members to find out what they believed was the biggest issues.

“It was one very small part of an enormous amount of work the university has been doing in the past seven months,” she said.

— by Danny Valentine