— College towns aren’t like other communities, so they should be able to adjust their laws accordingly.

That is the focus of a pair of bills in the state Senate, each aimed at helping police in college towns handle the problems associated with binge drinking by students.

Ronald Filippelli is borough council president in State College, home to Penn State’s massive main campus.

“Police are handcuffed,” he said during a forum last week in his town.

Leaders from other campus communities – including nearby Indiana Borough – voiced similar concerns.

Indiana Mayor George Hood said 40 percent of the incidents to which his police officers respond involve alcohol linked to IUP.

For starters, college kids under the age of 21 are prohibited by law from consuming alcohol at all – not that the law generally stops them from doing so.

And when college kids drink alcohol, many of them consume excessively. That leads to unlawful acts such as destruction of property, sexual assault and public drunkenness.

The bills would toughen enforcement options for police and the courts – higher fines and greater impact on an individual’s personal record.

Typically, towns look to the universities to maintain control over the students – who sometimes forget that they are guests in the towns where they are studying.

And most colleges these days invest considerable resources in alcohol education, telling incoming freshmen about the dangers of binge drinking – both for themselves and others around them.

Giving a bigger club to local police might be the only answer.

We continue to support allowing local entities to have a greater say in their own laws and governance.

To that end, we support the federal government yielding power to states, and states doing the same for counties and local municipalities to the extent that such action is feasible.

These college towns should be given the authority to police their streets as they deem necessary and protect all residents from senseless behavior.