Welcome to Marin County – Ferry Terminal, Sausalito, California

On Thursday December 8, 1988 scenic bayside Sausalito, where posh waterfront restaurants serve up spectacular views of San Francisco as well as fish dishes swimming in Hollandaise sauce, labeled itself the nation’s first "cholesterol-free zone."

The designation, meaningless as anything more than a health-education stunt by the City Council, was dreamed up by a local pharmacist and patterned after the recently popular idea of "nuclear-free zones" – cities and counties that outlaw the making, storage or use of nuclear bombs within their limits. Cholesterol has not been banned in Sausalito, just cast in public disfavor. The city has added its imprimatur to pharmacist Fred Mayer’s campaign to teach people to consume less fat in their diets and to exercise to keep their coronary arteries clear and healthy.

Mayer, father of the Great American Smokeout and National Condom Week among other public-health campaigns, said he wanted to alert people in nuclear-free Sausalito that a danger more immediate than nuclear annihilation could be as close as their dinner plate. So Mayer asked the city to do to rich sauces and heavy desserts what it did to atom bombs. The City Council agreed, passing a resolution last week urging Sausalito’s affluent, trend-conscious residents to fight any fatty deposits in their blood vessels.

On Thursday, Mayor Robin Sweeny made the city’s pioneering cholesterol-free designation official. "This is done in the spirit of trying to get the public’s attention. . . . If it gets a few laughs along the way, that is all right," she said, posing in a restaurant next to a display of low-cholesterol vegetables – before slipping off for a lasagna luncheon with the Rotary Club. ("Freddy would kill me if he knew that," said Sweeny, a former nurse.)

Shanon Davis, chef at Scoma’s Restaurant, said he was not aware of Sausalito’s pace-setting status in the war against cholesterol, but added that, coincidentally, he has decided to drop salmon with Hollandaise sauce from the eatery’s menu. His substitute, he conceded sheepishly, will not be much of an improvement, cholesterol-wise. It’s poached salmon in a white wine-and-cream sauce.

Los Angeles Times, December 9, 1988