Lunching Spots for Sales Clerks’

It is most unfortunate that workers at South Coast Plaza’s Crystal Court annex are being harassed, not only by the mall newsletter, but by the manager because they eat brown bag lunches while seated on the mall’s benches (“Posh Shopping Mall Suggests Sales Clerks Dine Out -- Literally,” Aug. 1)

The majority of the workers are women clerks who stand for eight hours per day, and who earn not much more than the minimum wage. They do not need a one-mile round trip hike to a park at lunchtime, nor can they afford the $12 tab at the only local eatery.

Instead of perpetuating despotism, the mall needs to spend a small amount of its $80-million construction budget, and use some of its 685,000-square-foot area, to make an attractive park-like setting within the mall for use by its employees.

MARTHA ABELL

Seal Beach