SW = Public Servants

Thanks for giving this issue [“Free at Last,” Jan. 31] the attention it obviously needs, and for performing even more of a public service by putting it on the cover!

Tom WelshPortland

Calling shenanigans

I read your article [“Butt Ugly,” Jan. 24], and I must say, you need to stop complaining. Because of the outcry against smokers and their secondhand smoke, they have been moved into the street, and now the complaint has turned to that of cigarette butts and the litter it creates. Well, what did you expect to happen? The smokers are moved outside without an ashtray, and now you and the health police are calling “shenanigans” because you forgot about the garbage that cigarette smoking creates. Whose job is it to clean it up, you ask. How about you and the people who cry against secondhand smoke? Why don’t you stop complaining, pick up a broom and dustpan, and clean up what your law made as a by-product?

Jeffry WilsonSeattle

Safety for smokers

I know a lot of smokers who purposely throw butts on the ground because of disgruntled feelings for the ban. The city should build smoking rooms and charge admission. They should also be heated because we don’t live in a tropical climate, unlike California and Hawaii, where bans are in 70–80 degree weather. These smoking rooms would make smoking safer for women alone in the city. Women have to walk 25 feet away from the safety of the establishment they are patrons of, leaving them open to robbery and assault. These rooms would pay back their own construction and upkeep with the admission fees, making the city cleaner and safer.

Sylvia TenioAuburn

Hooked on comic

Thank you for adding this hilarious comic [Basic Instructions, see p. 94] to your paper. I have not been a regular reader the last year or two, but now, thanks to Basic Instructions, I’m hooked again.

Ronna DanskySeattle

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