Senior unhappy about new no-smoking policy
How very disappointing to find this nanny state, citizen police attitude here in Montana. I moved here specifically from regulation-ridden Seattle to find the personal freedom and liberty Montana was known for.
This is regarding smoking in one's own home, which has been totally acceptable at Mountain View Manor until March 24 this year, as a new policy forbidding tenants to smoke in their own apartments. We who are grandfathered in, have an OK until April 2012. Our visitors may not smoke either. This hit me just as hard — "they" have the right to tell me a guest in my home cannot smoke. By the way this is not an official HUD mandate.
"They" are the seven members of the Whitefish Housing Authority board. We tenants were given the floor to vent, but all the indications show that it was just that — a venting session with no intention to sincerely consider our opinions.
Yes, "they" gave us two years notice, more than fair. However, I'll be 73 years of age and with a very limited income, and others may be in a worse situation. This is a major nightmare lurking on our doorstep. And I'll have a doctor-ordered companion pet — what a prize potential tenant I'll make, guess you'll all be rushing to rent to me. I don't want to move anyway.
Our manager reassures me I'll not be homeless. But when I signed my current lease at age 65, I thought this just might be it, my permanent home.
A few rabble-rousers here (who now have the law on their side) moved into the building when it was a smoking building and have been here at least two years. How come they rented in a smoking building? And now want to change this, bringing real distress to others.
We have many tenants here over 85 years old who are functioning quite well, at least three tenants over 90 and perhaps the only centenarian in Whitefish who have all resided in this building for more than 10 years. So perhaps our second-hand smoke has not been so deadly.
Please know we generally are a very well-behaved bunch here, with smokers being very considerate. We only ask that others be the same to us.
Renie Malik lives in Whitefish.