New state park and beach guidelines lack common sense

Like everyone, I’m pleased that the government is lifting restrictions on our daily lives. I’ve harbored various views of the these one-size-fits-all edicts ranging from extremely wise — especially for those who are high risk — to draconian, to unconstitutional. But for the first time, the state issued a rule that made me chuckle: the availability of bathrooms at state parks.

We’re told that beaches will be open but bathrooms will be closed [May 20, “Connecticut has released new guidelines for state parks and beaches this summer”]. Instead, portable toilets will be placed at various locations. I chuckled (actually almost guffawed) because it strains my credulity that cramped, smelly, dark portable toilets are more sanitary and thus safer than the larger, airy bathrooms in places like Hammonasset Beach State Park. Couple this with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s recent pronouncement that the coronavirus does not spread easily by touching an infected surface, and this default to portable toilets makes even less sense.

Instead of renting the green plastic hovels, the state would be wiser hiring folks to clean existing bathrooms and placing sanitizing dispensers by the sinks. Moreover, citizens have to do our share. We cannot leave food or dirty diapers and the like on the bathroom counters, and we must clean up after ourselves. I, for one, would be greatly relieved, if I could relieve myself in a real bathroom.

Harry Weller, West Hartford