That helped him win election as Oakland County Prosecutor in 1972, when he was only 33 years old. He then spent sixteen years chasing down bad guys and enforcing the laws.
Soon thereafter, Brooks was elected to the first of five terms as county executive, the job he holds now. He’s been flamboyant and controversial and a whiz at attracting jobs and investment.
Much of his early career was all about law enforcement. So it was somewhat mystifying when he announced yesterday that he wasn’t going to enforce the statewide smoking ban in workplaces, bars and restaurants, which takes effect May 1.
What’s more, he was going to file a lawsuit against the state to try and stop the ban from taking effect.
The reason, he said, was that the county can’t afford the extra cost of enforcing it. The state had failed to provide the extra funding needed to do so, making this another unfunded mandate.
My guess is that Patterson, who started his career as a populist, thought defying the government would be a popular position in this tea party age. Well, guess what. It wasn’t.
Patterson’s office was deluged with more than a hundred phone calls and e-mails, and, as he admitted yesterday, not a single one of them supported his move. Looking sheepish, L. Brooks announced yesterday afternoon that he was withdrawing the suit.
“I thought, I work for the people. If they don’t want me to do this, why would I then go out and do something that is unanimously rejected by the people who call my office,” he said.
Well, give him credit for recognizing reality. Ironically, Brooks Patterson is a lifelong non-smoker. What he failed to recognize is how strongly public opinion has turned against smoking.
Tobacco is, after all, the only legal product which, when used as directed, is guaranteed to eventually kill you. In recent years, people also have become aware of the danger of secondhand smoke.
If you aren’t a nicotine addict, cigarette smoke is foul and disgusting; it lingers in your clothes, your hair and can ruin a meal. Eighty percent of adults no longer smoke, and that percentage is even higher among the better educated voters Patterson represents.
Now, he does have a point about the cost of enforcing the ban, though it turned out Oakland County turned down $75,000 the state offered to help with that. That’s probably not nearly enough for the extra expense involved, true. However, any former prosecutor ought to recognize that a law is a law, and elected officials don’t have the freedom to decide which ones they will enforce.
That’s a prescription for anarchy. Patterson talked yesterday about the horrendous problems Ohio had enforcing its ban, but he ought to look again. Restaurant business in fact increased after the ban took effect, and taverns recovered after a slight dip.
We have a lot of problems in this state, but we are about to have cleaner air, and, almost certainly, less lung cancer and emphysema. If that’s not worth celebrating, I don’t know what is.
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