Are you seriously that naive to not know the financial benefit that VEISHEA plays to a lot of these campus groups? Some of these groups rely on VEISHEA as their main source of fundraising. I don't have the details on any of that, but I guess I figured that was pretty common knowledge. I wont argue that the benefits have to be weighed against the impacts; my point is that I don't think ISU/Ames has done a good job at trying to mitigate the impacts. They may think they have, but most everyone knew the "changes" that have been made in the past were going to do nothing to curb the negative effects.
You have to learn that big events like this are going to involve drinking. You cant stop it, you can only contain it. If you want the "party" to stop, the only method is to cancel VEISHEA. If you want to still have the benefits of VESIHEA, and try to get a better control on the party, there are definitely alternatives that could be explored. This task force has chosen to get rid of the party while failing to touch on the negative effects this will have on many organizations, and that is sad. I'm not arguing that we have a problem here; that much is obvious and I think we can all agree. I'm just arguing that there are other alternatives that could be effective and have yet to be explored.
And I'm not sure why we should be concerned as to what the citizens of Ames get out of this. We should be more concerned about what ISU students, faculty and alumni get out of it.