This Will Be An Interesting Day

Last evening, I learned that the property management company, from which my employer—Seattle Weekly—leases its offices, has declared a smoking ban in an alley behind the building. That’s where employees from the Weekly and other building tenants take their smoke breaks. Most of them follow the provisions of the state’s new Clean Indoor Air Act, which requires among other things that smokers stay 25 feet away from the entrances to publicly-accessible buildings, windows that open from these buildings and air intakes from the same. The alley and the sidewalk are both public property. I can find no ordinances or other local laws that state otherwise.

When I smoke out there, I do so on the sidewalk 25 feet away from entrances to the building. Even though I think the law is nuts (the 25 foot rule is a “presumptive safe distance,” and there is no data to back it up), I have decided to join my fellow smokers and stay 25 feet from entrances until this silly law can either be overturned in court or amended by the legislature. What’s more, Roger Valdez, the chief enforcer of the smoking ban in King County, has twice told me that the standard of enforcement is whether or not smoke is actually entering a building. I know for fact that no smoke is entering the building through doors, windows or air vents. It’s kind of windy down there mere blocks from Puget Sound.

But, now, the property management company has decided that smokers complying with the law just isn’t good enough for them. My guess is that this action is being driven by one occupant in the building, who has twice harassed me for smoking, even though I was obeying the law. I don’t know this man’s name. He has refused to provide it to me when I have asked him to do so. Last week, he gave me the middle finger.

Today ought to be an interesting day since I was at home yesterday with a stomach problem. When I get to work, I will review the memo from the management company. Then I will go outside and smoke on the sidewalk in the alley--all while obeying the 25 foot rule. I trust my employer will remain mute on this issue unless it merits coverage in the pages of the paper.

This nonsense over the 25 foot rule needs to stop. I hope I don’t get arrested or fined in the process. I cannot afford a lawyer or court fines. But I also cannot afford not to stand up to this nanny state horseshit and Seattle's emerging culture of presumption. This is America, not Singapore.