Commissioners Slated To Approve No Smoking Ordinance

Anonymous Letter Persuades Commissioners (Carta Anónima Persuade a Comisarios)

The Lee County Commissioners appear to finally be ready to establish an official no smoking ban in county buildings. It seems that an anonymous letter helped them make up their minds. Making laws on the basis of anonymous letters is a curious way to do business even if it leads to the right decision. (Maybe the supporters of LCHS should have tried that.) Commissioners struggled with establishing an official no smoking ordinance at their last meeting. (See previous post) This was to accommodate a request from the district attorney's office where second hand smoke was making a pregnant DA sick. What should have been a simple decision became one of seeming political consequence when the commissioners were told that the local bar association had voted 100% against the ban. Faced with that kind of opposition the commissioners wandered all over the place with Jerry Lemmond even turning to their $2000 a week consultant on Lee County High School for an opinion. Finally they did nothing after Commissioner Jerry Lemmond changed his vote (See video below) to take the measure off the table after looking to his right and getting a dirty look from Commissioner Robert Reives.

The anonymous letter claimed to be an attorney who explained that the vote by the bar was mostly good ol' boys sticking together (what is called the "universal attorney to attorney respect rule"). The letter said that in reality this was a fight launched by one attorney "who had pretty much set up his own smoke-filled office in the attorneys lounge." After mentioning all the benefits of the non-smoking rule and saying most all attorneys favored the ban, he urged them to act in the best interest of the people of the county. So, it looks like this little political drama will come to an end Monday. You can bet that Reives will have his signals straight with Lemmond before the matter comes up this time! Editors Note: If you want to send a copy of the entire post with the video just use the little envelop to forward the entire post. To send just a copy of the video copy and send this link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dV2ZhvIB0jQ .