No cigar? Sawyer vents about feeling ‘ostracized’ when he wants to light up
City Council budget hearings give Chicago aldermen a chance to vent their anger and air their pet peeves. Sometimes, things get personal.
That’s what happened Friday for cigarsmoking Ald. Roderick Sawyer (6th), chairman of the City Council’s Black Caucus.
Rosa Escareno, commissioner of the city’s Department of Business Affairs and Consumer Protection, was on the hot seat.
Sawyer saw his chance to unload about being treated like a pariah whenever he has a cigar in his hand — and he took it.
“Question of personal concern — and this might be a little touchy to some people, but I’ll go ahead and talk about it. I’m an occasional cigar smoker. It seems as if cigar smokers have been pushed out . . . to locations where it’s almost to underground locations just to enjoy a cigar and talk to friends,” Sawyer said.
“Is there a way that we can address that? I know we have an overall smoking ban. We have certain restrictions as to cigar shops. But when I talk to my friends [who] also smoke cigars, they feel like they’re ostracized. Like they have to resort to underground locations just to enjoy a cigar and conversation.”
“And a cognac,” said Budget Committee Chairman Carrie Austin (34th).
“And maybe a cognac,” Sawyer said. Escareno said she has no interest in “turning away businesses that have a great concept.”
She noted that there are “regulations in the books on tobacco businesses, but that doesn’t mean we can’t have a conversation about exactly what you’re thinking about.”
Sawyer was thrilled the door was at least open to change.
He’d like to find some way to make it legal for a store to sell cigars and let their customers light up on the spot — and maybe read a magazine or have a drink with friends — while sitting around in big leather chairs.
“No smoking in bars. We get that. But, why is it so sinister that I like two things that, in and of themselves are legal? But if I want to put them together almost anywhere outside of my own home — and I can’t even do that at home because my wife won’t let me,” he said.