Another election season is now upon the citizens of Athens-Clarke County, and, to no one's surprise, one of the issues that defines where political lines are drawn in the community has also surfaced again.

Helped along this year by recent stories in this newspaper noting that 40 arrests for underage drinking were made during the first weekend of the University of Georgia's fall semester, and that four new bars were set to open in downtown Athens, the question of where downtown is headed - and what, if any, controls should be placed on a nightlife fueled by dozens of bars and clubs - is once again likely to become a focus of this year's campaigns for Athens-Clarke's mayoral and commission seats.

What's amazing about "the downtown issue" is that it doesn't necessarily have to be an issue at all.

As this newspaper's Aug. 22 story, "40 charged with underage drinking over weekend," clearly indicates, people under 21 years of age indulging in alcohol use - and abuse - is a problem in the community. Just as clearly, downtown is a major locus of that problem, as illustrated by the fact, noted in the Aug. 22 story, that police on foot patrol arrested "several underage drinkers with beer on sidewalks outside of bars."

The logical inference to be made is that there are some bars in the downtown area that are serving alcohol to people under the legal drinking age. Need something more, albeit admittedly anecdotal, to bolster that conclusion? How about the Aug. 18 column in The Red & Black, UGA's independent student newspaper, in which the writer named a specific downtown bar that's "usually packed with freshmen."

In short, the only real "issue" in downtown Athens is that some bars are operating in violation of the law, serving alcohol to people too young, legally speaking, to consume it. Getting control of that issue shouldn't be particularly difficult, nor should it require any political gymnastics.

All that anyone holding a mayoral or commission seat - or who hopes to hold one of those seats - has to do is insist that laws pertaining to the legal drinking age are enforced in downtown Athens, and to make sure that the alcohol licenses of establishments that run afoul of those laws are revoked at the earliest opportunity.

Will that approach ensure that downtown Athens becomes a safe and appealing place for those who enjoy a night out that includes the consumption of an alcoholic beverage or two or three? Certainly not. Anytime alcohol is a factor in nightlife - in downtown Athens, or anywhere else - there's a possibility that unacceptable, even dangerous, behavior will ensue.

But clamping down on underage drinking would accomplish one important thing. It would keep any number of young people away from situations they are incapable of handling responsibly.

From that, it follows that, for the mayor and commission - and the people now seeking those offices - the "downtown issue" comes down to a relatively simple question.

Is the local tax revenue generated by alcohol sales so important they're willing to look away as some of that revenue is provided by underage drinkers, through downtown businesses operating in violation of the law?