A man and a woman from Sleepy Eye visited Albert Lea on Saturday. They were downtown and stopped at the Albert Lea Art Center.

They needed to use a restroom.

Here is a longtime downtown issue. Where can people find a place to go when they have to go?

A helpful woman explained that the Art Center restrooms are not public — a long time ago the city used to pay the Art Center to maintain public restrooms; when that stopped, the Art Center did it out of a community goodness; nowadays the Art Center and its landlord have a feud that prevents their use.

The couple was in town for no reason other than to check out Albert Lea.

The helpful woman escorted the couple to at least four businesses, all of which said no. The man eventually went to Sterling Drug, and the woman went to Fisher’s Jewelry.

Kudos to those businesses for their friendliness.

Indeed, there are public restrooms at Albert Lea City Hall, but that can be more of walk than some are willing to take.

It wouldn’t hurt for the Downtown Association to revisit the issue and perhaps lobby the city to work with them on a project. Collaboration and cooperation might get something accomplished.