BROOKLYN TOBACCO PARTY.(anti-smokers protest New York City's new tax on cigarettes)(Brief Article)

CLASH, which stands for Citizens Lobbying Against Smoker Harassment, is the only organization dedicated exclusively to protecting the rights of New York City smokers. It was founded two years ago by Audrey Silk, a thirty-eight-year-old police officer in Brooklyn's Sixty-seventh Precinct, who smokes between one and two packs a day and was, she says, "sick and tired of the government telling me how to live my life." Under Silk's leadership, CLASH has opposed the ban on smoking in restaurants, fought proposals to raise the tax on cigarettes, and worked to discredit scientific studies that link secondhand smoke to lung disease. After September 11th, CLASH called for tobacco companies to donate cigarettes to the rescue workers at Ground Zero.

A few weeks ago, as Mayor Bloomberg prepared to sign a bill to increase the city's cigarette tax from eight cents to a dollar-fifty, a public hearing was held at City Hall, and Silk showed up in a T-shirt with the words "Smoking Section" emblazoned on the front. She told the Mayor, "I know you love to eat chunky peanut butter with bacon and bananas. How about I start a campaign to tax that bacon that's going to cause heart disease, and tax that super-chunky peanut butter that's going to kill you?"

Despite these efforts, the tax increase went into effect the next day, and New York City became the most expensive place in the country to buy a pack of cigarettes. In retaliation, CLASH began distributing flyers urging smokers to boycott the tax increase by purchasing their smokes tax-free from the Indian tribes upstate.

The other day, CLASH held a meeting at the Ashford Arms pub, in Marine Park, Brooklyn. In addition to Silk, three people showed up: sixty-five-year-old Deb Sugar, of Sheepshead Bay; Deb's husband, Irv, age seventy-three; and Irv's sister Marlene Block, age sixty-eight. The group sat at a table in the back, and everybody lit a cigarette, except Irv, who has emphysema and quit smoking thirty years ago. Silk handed out flyers and petition forms.

DEB SUGAR: Smoking offers me a certain sense of peace. It relaxes me. I don't see why I'm being discriminated against.

AUDREY SILK: That's why we need to make sure smokers have information on how to boycott the tax.

MARLENE BLOCK: I think most people who are addicted already know how to avoid it.