BILLBOARDS COME DOWN IN 45 STATES

Providence, R.I. -Something will be missing on Valley Street
in Providence next week.

The Newport cigarette billboard will be taken down Friday in
accordance with a tobacco settlement signed in Rhode Island and 45
other states with four tobacco companies.

The companies agreed to remove all billboard and transit advertisement
and to turn over the remaining time on the lease of the space to the
state attorneys general.

The billboards that depict healthy-looking people smoking cigarettes
will now be replaced by tobacco-prevention messages. The Rhode Island
Department of Health Director Patricia Nolan said the affect will be
dramatic.

"Where the Marlboro Man and Joe Camel have preyed on our community for
decades, we now have an opportunity to give people some truthful
information they can use to increase the quality of their lives," she
said. Until now, the tobacco industry spent about $300 million a year
on outdoor advertising, Nolan said.

As of next week, nine billboards in the state will be showing off
anti-tobacco ads until December 1999.