SULTAN COMES DOWN HARD ON TEEN SMOKERS

SULTAN - Richard Sims knew cigarettes could be expensive, but he never
expected to shell out $190 for a couple of smoke breaks.

Yet that's what the sandy-haired high-school senior paid for two smoking
tickets handed out by a small-city police force that practically has made
underage smoking public enemy No. 1.

In the past 15 months, Sultan's nine-member police department has slapped
120 tickets on minors caught with cigarettes or chewing tobacco. They also
have hauled adolescent smokers in front of a community panel to ask why
they smoke, sent them to smoking-cessation classes and ordered them to
perform community service.

It's hard to say whether they have persuaded teens in Sultan to smoke less
or just to hide it better. But while some folks think officers ought to
worry about other matters, Police Chief Fred Walser is determined to fight
teen smoking, which is on the rise in Snohomish County and Washington state.

It wasn't always this way. Sultan used to be like many places: Teens would
smoke, and adults would frown but mostly look the other way.

Sims and other young smokers would hang out and share cigarettes behind the
gym or in the school parking lot. After school, some would congregate in
front of the public library on Main Street. Local business owners
complained about youths yelling at pedestrians, and tossing soda cans and
cigarette butts in flower pots.

Folks were getting fed up, says Walser, a towering man who has been in law
enforcement for 31 years, and became police chief of this city of 2,800 in
1996.

"They'd hang out down there and spit and smoke and swear," Walser says.
"One of the first things that greeted me was the question, `What are you
going to do about our blankety-blank kids hanging out on Main Street?' "

Walser, who sees smoking as a gateway to alcohol, marijuana and juvenile
crime, decided his officers would stop looking the other way.

At the time, minors couldn't legally buy Camels or chew Skoal, but
possession was technically OK. Walser persuaded the City Council to pass an
ordinance in February 1997 that explicitly banned tobacco possession by
minors and imposed hefty fines for violators, starting at $95. The state
Legislature approved a similar measure for all of Washington earlier this
year.

Sultan police passed out warning fliers for six months and started
enforcing the law in July 1997, handing out 84 citations in the first six
months.

Walser thinks the efforts have paid off. Teens are no longer smoking openly
at school, and complaints about juvenile crime have dropped 65 percent, he
says.

Judy Perkins, who runs a gift shop downtown, thinks Walser has worked wonders.

"It's like heaven here now. We used to have garbage in the street, kids
hanging around, tossing cigarettes in the street," she says, pointing to
the corner where teens used to cluster.

"I can see a tremendous improvement in our youth out here."

Sims may be one of the success stories. Before he quit four months ago, he
had smoked for more than 10 years, trying his first cigarette at age 7, and
stashing away cartons of Lucky Strikes and Marlboros by the time he turned 13.

He got his first ticket when he was sneaking a puff with friends on the
school lawn. Sultan police Officer Jeff Shelton spied on the smokers from
the bushes, videotaping them before passing out $95 tickets.

Later, Sims tried smoking behind the school gym, but Shelton nailed him
again - and another $95 went down the drain. Sims paid off his fine working
at the local Dairy Queen and his father's restaurant-supply business.

He is 18 now and can buy cigarettes legally, but he says getting busted as
a minor - plus a desire to join the wrestling team - helped persuade him to
kick the habit.

"A pack of cigarettes isn't really worth that much, I guess," he says. He
now chews gum compulsively.

Not everyone is so accommodating.

Rick Sims was hopping mad after his son got two smoking tickets.

"I just didn't approve of them sitting there videotaping kids smoking a
goddanged cigarette. It's not like they were smoking dope," Sims says.

"I think we've got a lot of other issues to worry about in life and to have
police officers on campus to issue tickets for smoking. I think they can do
something better with their time."

Andria Gee's 15-year-old daughter was cited last month for smoking at
school and given a $50 ticket - Sultan lowered its fine for a first offense
this year to conform to the new state law. Subsequent violations bring
penalties of $150 and $250.

"I was stunned," says Gee, who moved from Carnation three months ago.
"Sultan is so small. Why do they feel the need for this? Now the kids are
just smoking in the woods."

Sultan schools, however, are joining the zero-tolerance campaign. Students
caught smoking by police get detention or are ordered to attend school on
Saturday, and they have to write essays explaining why they were smoking.
Educators also have invited speakers, including a man who breathes through
a tube in his throat, to demonstrate the dangers of tobacco use.

Besides paying fines and being punished at school, youths cited for tobacco
possession must appear with their parents before a six-member panel of
community members that acts in lieu of a juvenile-court judge.

"It's not just a bunch of strangers. It's people you're going to run into
at the grocery store and everywhere else," says Mark Raney, a doctor who
sits on the panel.

The panel usually orders the young smokers to attend smoking-cessation
classes and perform community service like cleaning up the cemetery or the
local ballfield.

Police in other King and Snohomish County police departments say they have
started enforcing the new state law sporadically, but no one appears to be
attacking teen smoking with anything approaching Sultan's zeal.

"It depends what you want to focus your resources on," says Tim Buzzell, a
Monroe police officer who has patrolled local schools. He has written about
15 tickets to underage smokers since the state law went into effect in summer.

Seattle police are "not actively enforcing" the tobacco possession law
until a study group decides what approach they ought to take, according to
spokeswoman Carmen Best.

Michael Bard, senior patrol officer for the Edmonds Police Department, says
his officers usually just confiscate and destroy cigarettes, though they
occasionally will issue tickets.

Everyone involved says adolescents who really want to smoke are still
finding ways. And state and national surveys indicate that teen smoking is
on the rise. Twenty-nine percent of Washington state seniors said they were
smokers this year, up from 25 percent in 1992.

But Walser, who quit smoking decades ago, thinks just getting teens to hide
their habit is a victory.

"When other kids don't see that group sitting there smoking, they're less
likely to try and join it," he says.

"We send the wrong message to kids when we say it's illegal to possess
tobacco and then just wink at it. We don't tolerate it in this city. We
don't wink at it."

Checked-by: Pat Dolan