Springfield officials will continue to look at ways to provide training for those who may be manning the beer tent at the upcoming fall festival.

The festival, sponsored by the Springfield Merchants Association, will be held Oct. 12-13 along Laurel Street. The Merchants Association has applied for an alcohol license, with plans to sell beer at the event. Council members have asked what kind of training those volunteers staffing the beer tent, from those checking identifications to ensure consumers are of age to those dispensing the beer, will have.

"We have to be very careful," said council member Steve Shealy. "The law provides the purveyor of alcohol is liable if someone they are serving gets into an accident and hurts someone."

As an example, Shealy said a New England town was sued after two underage drinkers got into an accident after drinking in the parking lot. Shealy, who is in the hotel business in Savannah and has alcohol licenses there, backs having the volunteers receive training and certification, perhaps through the e-TIPS online course.

"E-TIPS seems to be a good option," said City Manager Brett Bennett. "It’s an online certification that seems to be easy to get at a nominal cost. The idea is to protect us from potential liability. It’s hard to deal with someone who has had too much to drink and how to identify when someone has had too much to drink."

Jamey Stancell, president of the Springfield Merchants Association, said he did not know how many volunteers would be working the beer tent, but he anticipated the people in charge of it would be those he knew and trusted to be in charge of it.

"I prefer them to be Merchants Association members," he said. "I want to know you because my name is on the alcohol license. I have two people who have been told they are doing IDs. When they get too busy is where things don’t get checked. My first job is to make sure that they are not too busy."

Shealy said Savannah takes their level of protection even further. Servers must be certified, and they are fingerprinted and subjected to a background check.

"No one plans an accident happening; no one plans on being too busy," Shealy said. "I just feel that we as a city need to have protection. I think an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure."

Stancell said he would be willing to pull back his alcohol license application and said his group was following the path the Effingham Chamber of Commerce took in holding the Taste of Effingham.

"We looked at how the Chamber handles it," he said. "We didn’t think it was any different. I’m not mad about this. We’ll apply for a license. But the rules changed in the middle of the game. Under the current ordinance, there were none of these stipulations.

"Are we being picked on? I don’t think so. I’m not happy about it, but I’m not going to complain."

Stancell also said he has operated restaurants in South Carolina. "I know alcohol," he said.

He also said event organizers have no idea how much of a crowd they will have.

"We have no data, no history to go on," he said. "This is the first movement in this direction in this county."

The e-TIPS program is not a "silver bullet," Stancell added.

"I don’t want to do anything that’s going to create hardship," Shealy said. "I want to make it as simple as possible but give us some protection. What would have happened at Taste of Effingham had someone gone out on 21 and caused a wreck?

"All it takes is one accident, and where will we be?"

Anheuser-Busch has signed on as a sponsor and is putting "a sizable contribution into the pile," Stancell said. They will have a breathalyzer and a tow-to-go service at the event.

"The last thing they want and the last thing the Merchants Association wants, is an incident of any kind," he said.

Council members said they wanted to be able to find a solution to provide adequate training without placing a burden on the Merchants Association.

"I’m trying to find a happy medium," said council member Troy Allen.

Council member Charles Hinely said the thinks they can get enough people certified in serving alcohol safely to hold the event.

"There ain’t no way around it," he said. "We wind up in court too much by accident. We don’t need to do it on purpose. We want you to have the event. For this event, we want the Is dotted and the Ts crossed. Let’s not let the pouring certificate stop the event."