Holy COW! This is NEWS!!!!!! THANKS, OZONE!
Posted on 12/18/2002 6:29:07 PM PST by ozone1
Smoking ban backlash ensnares AIDS group
By EMILY C. DOOLEY STAFF WRITER PROVINCETOWN - It began with an angry letter shortly after he was named executive director of the AIDS Support Group of Cape Cod.
Then Mark Baker received a handwritten note on the back of a donation card.
"Due to my recent decline in salary since the smoking ban, I regret that I am unable to make a donation at this time," wrote bartender and regular donor Michael Pickens.
Baker works for the support group and is also chairman of the Provincetown Board of Health, which approved a smoking ban in bars and restaurants last May.
Though separate in practice, the two aspects of Baker's life have collided. And the support group is taking the hit, Baker said.
Bar and restaurant owners say their business has fallen since the ban took effect Oct. 1. While nearly 200 people plan to speak against the ban at a board of health meeting tomorrow, others are protesting with their wallets.
"This is the man who caused a drastic cut in my pay and now he's asking me to donate money," Gifford House bartender Ricky Harrington said. "Because of him I can't donate."
Joseph Neumeister, who provided free haircuts to support group clients at The Bradford Hair Stop, threatened to stop the service unless Baker was removed from the support group.
"Otherwise," Neumeister wrote in a letter, "like a country placing sanctions against a country for unfair elections, the Bradford Hair Stop will not provide free haircuts or will not donate any charitable contributions."
Baker stayed. The haircuts stopped.
The situation is unsettling to Baker, who thinks the backlash will hurt the nearly 400 clients the support group serves from Provincetown to Falmouth. The support group offers services ranging from legal service and medical care referrals to prescription pickups and a food pantry.
"The thing that troubles and concerns me is that something I've been a part of in another facet of my living in Provincetown has had an impact on the clients and staff," Baker said. "I think it's reprehensible."
Baker can't point to any concrete numbers showing a hit in fund raising, but he said all the little instances will add up, especially because of state budget cuts.
That's not something Harrington and Pickens want to happen. Both said they would gladly help any support group member in need, but they would rather give money directly to a client.
About 35 percent of the support group's nearly $1.5 million budget comes from fund raising, Baker said. Volunteers also work about 8,000 hours a year.
Those opposed to the smoking ban say the decision should have gone to a town meeting vote, rather than an appointed committee.
Traci Myhrum, who has organized people to push for reconsideration, said she has heard that a few people are using money and services to fight back. There is, however, no organized effort to stop donations, she said.
"The majority of people tend to feel that is punishing the wrong people," Myhrum said.
Board of health members voted 3-1 in favor of the measure to protect bar and restaurant workers from secondhand smoke, which kills an estimated 53,000 nonsmokers in the United States every year, according to the Journal of the American Medical Association.
Kay Halle and Ken Janson, who also voted in favor of the ban, were not available for comment.
"Many of us wear many different hats and I don't think any of our actions should be held against whomever or whatever we work for," Baker said. "Would that be the norm, you wouldn't find anyone willing to step forward."
This is the way to express displeasure, Harrington said. It's a constant topic of conversation at his bar and with others in the industry.
"Mark Baker is a marked man," Harrington said. "He's there to raise money and if he can't raise money that's going to impede his job. They feel like he's messing with their jobs, they're going to try to mess with his anytime, anyhow."
Holy COW! This is NEWS!!!!!! THANKS, OZONE!
What goes around comes around. LOL!
ozone, the head of the Mental Hospital in southern Maine has forbidden the patients from smoking. Can you believe the cruelty of human beings? It's mind boggling.
What they think is reprehensible is that his desire to control and manipulate others has impacted their lives and their standard of living. They are voting with their money.
These controlling twits have no notion of compromise and accomodation.
Ever see them argue why all bars and restaurants need to be non-smoking?
No sympathy here.
I guess he wants to pump them full of drugs, instead.
Guess they still don't know that Aids is as preventable as smoking related diseases.
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