Let's raise a glass to easing up

Rose Walter was born way back during World War I. But she hasn't felt this young since, well, since about World War II.

That was the last time she guesses she got carded for going into a bar and having a drink. Fifty or sixty years ago. Until now, that is.

A few weeks ago, Rose — who is 91 — went with her daughter Elizabeth, 52, to enjoy a Christmas Eve cocktail at Von's Grand City Cafe, a martini bar on Pine Street in downtown Seattle's shopping district.

Rose didn't bring along her purse. She's been forgetful of late, leaving things behind. Her daughter was buying anyway, so why bother?

Big mistake. The waitress carded Rose. When Rose couldn't produce proof of her age, she was told she couldn't order a drink and would have to leave the bar.

"I was kind of in shock," Rose says. "I didn't know I looked so young!"

It's true Rose has the cheeks of a cherub and the energy of a kid 70 years her junior. She manages a 27-unit apartment building in Queen Anne. She volunteers at St. Vincent de Paul. She still hits Seattle bars a couple times a year.

Yet she was born before Prohibition. She's got great-grandkids who are of legal age to drink. And now she gets carded?

"In the good old days," Rose says, "I don't remember things being so fussy."

Welcome to Seattle 2008, Rose. Fussy is our middle name.

You probably won't be surprised the manager at Von's feels he no longer has a choice but to ask for ID, even if it's a centenarian hobbling in with a cane.

"Obviously you have heard what's going on downtown lately, with the mayor and the Police Department and the liquor board," said Greg Galuska, Von's manager. "They've blatantly put out an agenda that they're going to penalize bar operators.

"We decided that to protect ourselves in this environment, we had to move to 100 percent ID compliance," he said. "No exceptions. It's not worth risking imprisonment on the part of me or my staff."

He's referring to the infamous "Operation Sobering Thought," the nightclub and bar sting last August. Police went undercover to sneak 19- and 20-year-olds into bars using fake IDs, then charged 27 bartenders and bouncers who fell for it or looked the other way.

No big deal — except the cops then tossed them all in jail for a night. Now the city is compounding its excessiveness by seeking to jail the bouncers for another 20 to 30 days.

So bars are wise to be vigilant for underage drinking. This is hardly that. This is more like overage drinking.

Look at Rose's picture. I'd be ecstatic if I'm half that cute when I'm her age. Or if I were now.

But as Rose says: "With these wrinkles, I think it's obvious I stopped trying to pass for 16 long ago!"

Even the state Liquor Control Board says bars only have to check IDs of "youthful appearing persons." Which it has defined as "anyone who does not look at least 30 years of age."

"I know, I know," says Joel Parkans, Von's assistant manager, when I tell him I think the whole thing is absurd. "It wasn't always this way. Maybe we are more careful than most. But we felt because of the city's actions we had to have a blanket rule."

Elizabeth Walter, Rose's daughter, says this incident is trivial by itself.

Yet she does wonder what's become of her city.

"We're supposed to be so liberal, but then we have this police state that's encroaching on us, in small ways, just little by little by little," she said.

That's the downside of all these rules and regs and zero-tolerance policies. They're well-intended. But they trample common sense.

Which brings me to my request. Hey, mayor, police chief, city attorney: Ease up a little, will you? By all means, crack down on the street brawlers, the gangbangers, the gun-toting hoods.

But do you want Seattle to be known as the city that's so square, so obsessed with the law's letter and oblivious to its spirit, that it would card its own grandmother?

I mean great-grandmother.

Come to think of it, a good place to start on the easing up would be for the three of you to take Rose Walter back to Von's and buy her that drink.

Danny Westneat's column appears Wednesday and Sunday. Reach him at 206-464-2086 or dwestneat@seattletimes.com.