I never did understand how smoking and fouling the air everybody else must breathe in public establishments was somehow a "right" of smokers...

Personally I find few things as annoying as stepping into a public bar or restaurant and having to choke and gag all through my meal on the carcinogenic fumes wafting over from the smoking section...

Hey, smokers, light up and puff away all you want - in the privacy of your homes or private smoking clubs. But not in the air that I have to breathe.

Bars, clubs may get ban on smoking

Hub, 11 other communities plan new rules

By Stephen Smith, Globe Staff, 5/23/2002

The last public indoor haunts of smokers would become tobacco-free under a campaign to be unveiled today by top health officials in Boston and 11 neighboring cities and towns.

Since last fall, a group of urban public health commissioners has been quietly laying the groundwork to ban smoking in the remaining businesses where it is still widely allowed: bars and nightclubs. Today, they plan to announce a joint effort to draft new smoking rules that they hope can be passed in all 12 communities.

''No one is telling anyone they can't have a cigarette - just don't have a cigarette in a public place where you're exposing workers to a carcinogen,'' said Cheryl Sbarra, director of the tobacco control program at the Massachusetts Association of Health Boards.

The move is the latest in a series of public strikes at smoking in Massachusetts. The city of Boston outlawed smoking in restaurants in 1998, although smoking is still legal in bars. Smoking has been illegal in all Brookline businesses, including bars, for six years. Already, a broad swath of Cape Cod is completely smoke-free. Amherst, a college town, has had a ban for several years.

In addition to Boston, the new plan includes health commissioners from Cambridge, Somerville, Chelsea, Everett, Malden, Medford, Newton, Revere, Saugus, and Watertown. The group also includes Brookline, where smoking in bars and restaurants was banned in 1996.

The campaign's prospects for success appear to be good. In most of the communities represented, the smoking ban can be implemented through health regulations alone, and do not require further political action.
The Massachusetts Restaurant Association vigorously opposed earlier efforts by the Legislature to enact a ban, but association president Peter Christie said yesterday it would be difficult to challenge powerful local health boards.

''It seems to me like they have already spoken and already made their decision,'' Christie said.

Smoking bans are generally opposed by restaurant and bar owners, who argue that less smoking translates into less business. At Wally's, the legendary South End jazz club, the owners estimate 70 percent of patrons smoke.

''We're a smoking club, in more than one way,'' said Lloyd Poindexter, whose family owns Wally's. ''We're not necessarily pro-smoking, but bars and clubs should be the last refuge for smokers - smoking and drinking, it goes hand in hand for a lot of people.''

So far, California and Delaware have been the only states to ban smoking in bars statewide. In Massachusetts, although any bar can impose a voluntary ban on smoking, legislative efforts to enact a statewide smoking ban in restaurants and bars have foundered on opposition from trade groups.

In Brookline, both health regulators and restaurant owners say the results have been far less damaging than predicted. An independent study commissioned by the city shortly after restrictions were imposed showed no change in bar and restaurant revenues, and a later report found that business had actually increased, said Alan Balsam, Brookline's public health commissioner.

At O'Leary's, a bar on Beacon Street in Brookline, the smoking ban hurts late-night business after the kitchen closes, but food sales have improved overall, said owner Aengus O'Leary.

''So, the overall net effect is probably zero,'' O'Leary said. ''But without wishing to sound selfish, I would like to see the ban everywhere because it would level the playing field.''

In interviews yesterday, the commissioners from Boston and Cambridge said a broad, simultaneous ban would reduce the chance that bars would simply lose business to neighboring communities with less restrictive smoking rules.

They said their prime motivation was protecting the health of bartenders and servers exposed to smoke for hours. They cited research that said restaurant workers have a 50 percent higher incidence of lung cancer than the general population.

Smoking is already restricted in restaurants in most Massachusetts cities and towns, including Boston and Cambridge. Restaurants in Boston can allow smoking in their bar area only if separated from dining tables by a wall or a six-foot buffer zone.

In Boston, the rule was passed by the Public Health Commission; in Cambridge, by the City Council. Health departments are responsible for enforcing the restaurant restrictions, and regulators in Boston and Cambridge report they rarely have to resort to giving citations to compel compliance.

In California, where the statewide ban went into effect in 1998, not every bar immediately complied. But aggressive enforcement began in places such as Contra Costa County earlier this year. A detective in the Northern California county prowls bars and nightclubs hunting for scofflaw smokers. Often, he gets tips from bars that tell them of competitors that aren't being vigilant in enforcing the ban. Since January, the detective has issued eight citations.

''I think most places have taken the stance that, yeah, maybe they'll cheat on this law a little bit until they get their fingers burned,'' said Captain Scott Daly, of the Contra Costa sheriff's office. ''And then they'll take the steps to comply.''