Not too surprisingly, the last chapter of the new anti-smoking ordinance has not yet been written.
“Exemptions are never clear,” said Joe Cherner, founder of a group that advocates smoking bans. “That’s why in most cities there are regulations put out after a law passes, which clear up the confusion.”
Some questions raised this week can be answered by carefully examining the ordinance. Bingo halls, gaming facilities, billiard halls and sports arenas are among the list of public places where smoking is banned.
But others are not as clear-cut: What about hookah bars? Private clubs? Could bars declare themselves private to sidestep the ban?
In other smoke-free cities, lawsuits have settled some of those questions.
“We wrote it as clearly and tightly as we could,” said Elena Marks, White’s health-policy director. “If in practice it doesn’t do what we intended it to do, then we will rework it.”
The new ordinance specifies what qualifies as a cigar shop: an establishment that brings in at least 60 percent of its revenue from tobacco product sales.
It also defines a tobacco bar, where sales of smoking products for use at the establishment must exceed 20 percent of revenue. To qualify, tobacco bars must use an air-ventilation system, buy a permit from the city and offer health insurance for employees. They also must have been in operation by Sept. 1 of this year, which prevents bar owners from changing the nature of their business to qualify after the ban goes into effect.
Hookah bars, Marks said, would have to comply with the same rules to allow smoking.
Hotels and motels, too, have their own restrictions; no more than 35 percent of rooms in a hotel can be designated for smoking.
But the exemption for “designated enclosed meeting areas in convention centers, hotels, motels and other meeting facilities, only during times the meeting areas are in actual use for private functions” is a bit murky, some council members said.
Under the ordinance, a meeting facility is defined as a building that’s used primarily for private functions, and a private function is a gathering to which attendees receive an invitation.
“Nothing here is clear,” said Councilwoman Addie Wiseman, who argued that public events could pass as private so long as the organizer sent out some sort of invitation.
Private clubs will have to prohibit smoking just like other workplaces, Marks said. And one room within a public restaurant or bar cannot qualify as an exempted meeting place.
“If we see that somebody is flouting the intent of the law, then we’ll deal with it,” Marks said.
Frankly, I think Council Member Wiseman is protesting too much. All laws are subject to interpretation. Is this law clear for the majority of cases and just fuzzy around the fringes? If so, then I fail to see why it’s any more problematic than most. Is there a lawsuit in the works to overturn the ordinance, as there was in Austin? If not, then what are we worried about? And if there is, did we address the issues Judge Sparks highlighted or not? I’m not really sure what the fuss is right now.
I’m not really sure what the fuss is right now.
Even after that huge blockquote (I hope the grouchy Chronicle librarian doesn’t notice!), I’m not sure either. But Alexis Grant and her editor(s) must surely have thought enough people were uncertain (besides Councilmember Wiseman) for it to merit a story in the big Hearst print daily.
Clearly, this ordinance will disallow smoking in over 99% of the places a non-smoker might go in the course of a day. But, for some, the point is not that they will never be in contact with smoke. It is that somewhere, someday, someone might actually ENJOY a cigarette…and THAT is unacceptable. And, these nosy, intrusive voters deserve a voice. Adie Wiseman gives these needling pricks that voice.