Revelers take to the streets for a more subdued State Patty’s Day

If you ask some veterans of State Patty’s Day, they might tell you the student-created event is phasing out.

But if you ask some newbies, the party is just getting started.

On Saturday morning, downtown streets were filled with people dressed as if it were St. Patrick’s Day.

Kildare’s Pub on East College Avenue doesn’t normally have bouncers at the door checking customer identification on a Saturday morning or early afternoon, but this Saturday, they did.

General manager Kevin Carpin said it was a way to help keep the potential for havoc under control during the 10th annual State Patty’s Day.

“We’re going about business as usual — we’re doing everything we did last year with extra staff and extra security,” Carpin said. “We didn’t have any problems last year, we actually sold a lot of food, but the problem is they just start too early.”

State Patty’s Day is a Penn State student-created event initiated in 2007 to provide an alternative celebration date for St. Patrick’s Day when the holiday fell during Spring Break. The faux holiday has continued every year since, despite efforts by Penn State, State College borough and some local bars to curtail the negative effects.

Like many downtown establishments, Kildare’s opened at 11 a.m.

State College police Lt. Brad Smail said crowds started forming downtown at about 11 a.m. and were steady through the day since noon.

“There seems less (activity) than previous State Patty’s Days, but more activity than a normal Saturday in February,” he said.

In 2013, Penn State teamed up with the State College borough to offer downtown businesses a $5,000 subsidy to either close down or stop the sale of alcohol on State Patty’s Day.

The following year, beer distributors were added to that list of businesses.

Depending on the size of the establishment, businesses were given $2,500 to $7,500 to compensate for the estimated daily sales it would’ve normally had.

According to the university, money offered to businesses came from parking fees.

Penn State also released a report in 2014 citing the drop in crime.

“Combined with the improvements from 2013, arrests and citations declined by 76 percent over the last two State Patty’s Day weekends and the number of reported crimes and ordinance violations declined by 56 percent,” the report said.

Those figures were reportedly compiled by State College Police Department, University Police, Centre County Alcohol Task Force and the borough’s Ordinance Enforcement Office.

From early Friday morning to late Saturday afternoon, more than 60 reports of noise complaints, ordinance violations, public drunkenness and underage drinking incidents were reported, Smail said.

Smail said most of the reports were officer initiated.

“That means an officer scoped things out while on duty, and if they saw something suspicious they checked things out,” he said.

Last year, the borough attempted to curb the holiday by creating the Thaw Festival — a local take on a music, film and comedy fest.

The idea was to create more attraction to the festival than to State Patty’s Day, Damon Sims said last year.

Sims, Penn State vice president for student affairs, said he and borough Manager Tom Fountaine co-chaired the State Patty’s Day Task Force, which created events like Thaw, with the ambition of ending State Patty’s Day and filling the void left during that weekend with “an event benefiting a thriving college community, one that would be appealing to students and permanent residents alike.”

This year, there were no alternative events coordinated by the borough or university, but police said they ramped up security.

“It’s just part of making sure we have things covered,” Smail said. “There are a lot of parties. ... It’s like a football weekend.”

By early next week, the department will release a list of total reports, Smail said.

Penn State senior Rachel Bellamy has seen the efforts to keep the holiday celebrations to a minimum, but still believes the event will “never be what it used to.”

“You just hear stories about how crazy it used to be, and now I can’t really tell the difference between what’s going on now, and what goes on during homecoming weekend,” Bellamy said.

She said upperclassmen are starting to settle down, while younger college students are taking advantage of their first State Patty’s Day.

“A lot of us are finding a way to celebrate without being nutty about it,” Bellamy said.

State Patty’s Day Facebook page administrators posted a poll of those participating.

According to the survey by 1:45 p.m. Saturday, nearly 570 people said this was their first time celebrating State Patty’s Day. The participation numbers decreased for every year after that.

“You want to go all out your first year because it’s something new and something fun, and something your peers are involved in, but as the years go by, it gets old,” junior Heather Mothersbaugh said. “I think as time goes on, it will settle down to the point it’s not as crazy anymore.”

Smail said it’s hard to predict what the event will be like in the future.

“We just treat it like any other busy weekend, and hope people can act smart about their decisions,” he said.

This story was originally published February 27, 2016 at 1:55 PM with the headline "Revelers take to the streets for a more subdued State Patty’s Day."