Penn State enjoyed a banner day yesterday when news broke that the school raised over $12 million in its annual THON marathon. Now, some sadder news. But first, cue the Sad Penn State stock image:

There we go. 

State Patty's Day—the five-year-old Penn State tradition started after the school's Spring Break schedule necessitated a different day for the undergrads to celebrate St. Patrick's Day—has essentially been canceled this year. School administrators and local leaders teamed up and bribed, (no), paid off, (no)... handed dirty money in brown paper bags (that's it!) to 34 locations downtown with the condition that they don't serve booze on February 23. They're offering each location $5,000 to not distribute alcohol. That's $170,000 paid in partially public funds all so a bunch of kids won't get drunk on a Saturday. That's absurd.

Here are the establishments taking the bribe, via the Daily Collegian:

1. The Saloon

2. Inferno Brick Oven and Bar

3. bar bleu

4. The Hopshop Beer Market

5. The Deli Restaurant (serving food only)

6. Z Bar

7. The Lion's Den

8. The Shandygaff

9. The Tavern (serving food only)

10. The Gingerbread Man (serving food only)

11. The All-American Rathskeller

12. Spats Café and Speakeasy (serving food only)

13. The Phyrst

14. The Clover

15. Brewsky's Bottle Shop at The Day's Inn Penn State

16. Rotelli (serving food only)

17. Levels

18. Bill Pickle's Tap Room

19. Indigo

20. Allen Street Grill (serving food only)

21. The Corner Room (serving food only)

22. Zeno's

23. Chumley's

24. Zeno's ToGo

25. Sharkey's Bar & Bottle Shop

26. The Brewery

27. The Darkhorse

28. Kildare's (serving food only)

29. Duo

30. Chili's Grill & Bar (serving food only)

31. Café 210 West (serving food only)

32. Mad Mex (serving food only)

33. Zola New World Bistro (serving food only)

34. The Atherton Hotel (serving food only)

Look, there are Penn State students out there who think St. Patty's Day has gotten too big. Says Brandon, BroBible's senior editor (an alum): "Ain't nothing like the first time and State Patty's is basically a shell of what it was the first two years (it was moved to a Saturday my senior year)... Basically, it hit the entire town like a drunk, beer-bong a-bomb. Bars were swamped at 9am, etc. But it probably should have died years ago and everyone should have gone back to getting fucked up on St. Patty's, but it sorta took a life of its own. Now it attracts throngs of boneheads from all across Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Maryland with very little affiliation to Penn State. Those tools ruined it for everyone else. It probably should have died years ago. But, as the public at large has learned over the past few years, 'traditions' don't exactly die easily at Penn State."

But the way they've gone about essentially canceling this is profoundly weird and incredibly dumb. If things are too rowdy, consider a drink limit or ban the sale of liquor. Now, though, you've just opened up the celebration to take place elsewhere, whether it's on campus or in the dorms or on Frat Row. Spending $170,000 in public funds to pay off bars to stop an event that already is going to happen?

Is Antoine Walker running the city's budget there?