Beach Smoking Ban Is OKd by Council

Los Angeles City Council members voted unanimously Friday to ban smoking on the city’s beaches.

Public health and environmental advocates burst into applause upon approval of the ordinance, which could go into effect before June.

Following a similar vote by the Santa Monica City Council in March, the action, if approved by the mayor, would ban smoking from Malibu to Manhattan Beach. The Santa Monica council faces one more vote on its ordinance before the ban can take effect.

Councilman Jack Weiss, who has pushed for the law for months after reading of a similar one in San Diego County, said he hoped Los Angeles’ actions would “catalyze a discussion throughout the state about where it is socially acceptable to smoke.”

Not only does secondhand smoke pose a public health risk, he said, but discarded butts leach chemicals into the sand and water, endangering plants and animals. “I hope it leads to cleaner beaches up and down the California coast,” Weiss said.

But Richard Hall, a husky-voiced smoker who drove from Redondo Beach to make his complaints known, said council members are unnecessarily restricting the rights of a large segment of the population.

“Where can a smoker go [if not] the open air of a public beach,” he said.

“I can’t go to bars. I can’t go to Little League ... I feel I am paying highly for my habit and lifestyle.”

In response to such concerns, council members agreed to form a task force to study whether to create smoking zones on certain patches of sand.

But that will not stop the ban from going into effect 30 days after it is signed by the mayor.

A spokesman for Mayor James K. Hahn said he would sign it soon.

Scofflaws could face a fine of up to $250, but city officials said they do not expect to be dispatching officers to march up and down the sand writing tickets.

The point of the ordinance is to raise people’s awareness of the public health and environmental dangers, city officials said.

And, much as a similar ban on smoking in the city’s parks, officials expect the law to be self-enforced.