18 Summers to Be a Kid to Prevent Underage Drinking
40% of Riverside 9th graders say alcohol is easy to get. Most of it comes from home.
You only have 18 summers with your kid. Make sure they get to be one.
Join Riverside parents and neighbors protecting our kids’ well-being, one summer, one year at a time
First, a thank you.
If you’re the parent who asks where they’re going. Who knows the other parents. Who makes them eat the vegetables, practice the piano, get off the screen, finish what they started…thank you.
If you’re the parent who has said no to a party, a sleepover, a “just one drink, it’s no big deal,” … thank you.
At Blue Zones, we measure well-being in a lot of ways. But one of the most powerful indicators of a thriving community is simple:
“Someone in my life encourages me to be healthy.”
Just one supportive adult can make a difference. Someone like you.
WHY THIS SUMMER
The 100 Deadliest Days are coming.
Between Memorial Day and Labor Day, teen DUIs, alcohol-related injuries, and fatalities spike across the country. Riverside is no exception. In the past year, our city recorded 510 DUI arrests—most concentrated downtown between 8 and 11 PM.²
Between Memorial Day and Labor Day, DUIs, alcohol-related injuries, and deaths spike across the country. Riverside is no exception. Last year, our city recorded 325 DUI arrests between these holidays—that’s 3 per day.
But here’s the part most parents don’t see: the alcohol fueling those nights doesn’t always come from a bar or a liquor store. Riverside retailers are largely compliant with the law.³
It comes from someone’s house.
We get the instinct. Now let’s rethink it.
For years, a lot of good-hearted parents believed the safest thing to do was to let the kids drink at home. Keep them close. Take the keys. At least they’re under our roof.
We understand that instinct. It comes from love.
But the data coming out of Riverside is telling us something new.
- Youth in our community often get alcohol from home and social sources, not stores.**⁴
- 1 in 4 Riverside middle and high schoolers see no harm in drinking five or more drinks at a sitting once or twice a week.**⁵
- Among Riverside teens who experience chronic sadness, alcohol use rates are nearly three times higher than their peers.**⁶
Our kids aren’t just at risk of a hangover. Many are at risk of self-medicating during the hardest years of their lives and the alcohol that gets them there is often within arm’s reach in a familiar kitchen.
The good news? Riverside parents are already the single strongest protective factor in a teen’s life. We don’t need to replace that, we need to back it up with a policy that matches what the responsible parents are already doing.
That’s why Blue Zones Project Riverside is championing updates to the Riverside Social Host Accountability Ordinance (Chapter 9.07), strengthening enforcement and adding meaningful fines so the adults who are already holding the line have a community, and a city, holding it with them.⁷
Join Riverside parents and neighbors protecting our kids' well-being, one summer, one year at a time. Fill out the form below to learn more.
FOOTNOTES
- California Healthy Kids Survey, Riverside Unified School District, 2021–22.
- City of Riverside Crime Dashboard, December 2023–December 2024.
- Riverside Police Department crime data, 2024.
- Blue Zones Project Riverside Discovery Report, Alcohol Policy, November 2024.
- California Healthy Kids Survey, Riverside Unified School District, 2021–22 — student alcohol/drug use disaggregated by chronic sadness, Grades 7, 9, and 11.
- Riverside Municipal Code, Chapter 9.07: Social Host Accountability Ordinance.
