Anaheim Puts Off Vote on Smoking Law : Council Says Rules on Restaurant Signs Need Further Revision

Deciding that further revisions are needed on a controversial smoking ordinance, the Anaheim City Council voted Tuesday to delay final action on the matter.

The revisions involve rules regarding the posting of smoking/no-smoking signs in restaurants. The ordinance is scheduled to come back for a final council vote March 18.

The ordinance has raised the wrath of the Anaheim Chamber of Commerce, and when the City Council declined Tuesday to revise sections of the measure that would apply to private workplaces, chamber Executive Director Allan B. Hughes criticized what he called the council’s “little regard for the business community.”

That section of the proposed ordinance is patterned after a similar law in Long Beach, viewed as one of the most stringent in Southern California, City Atty. Jack White said.

First proposed last November, the ordinance has gone through various revisions, including the relaxation of language regarding both local restaurants and the Anaheim Convention Center.

Faced with opposition from many restaurant owners, council members last month changed the proposed ordinance to say that establishments with a capacity of at least 50 people have to designate “an adequate amount of seating capacity” for nonsmokers. The latest version does not specify what “adequate” would be. An earlier version said restaurants had to provide half of their space to nonsmokers.

Other amendments to the ordinance affect the Anaheim Convention Center. The current version reads that smoking “may be prohibited” in auditoriums or enclosed facilities open to the public. In the case of the convention center, the ordinance would not mandate smoking restrictions but leaves the decision to the tenants renting the center.

At Anaheim Stadium, the proposed ordinance also leaves smoking regulations to the discretion of the tenants of suites and executive boxes.

Hughes said it is unfair to require mandatory smoking controls in private workplaces when restrictions at the convention center will be up to the tenants.

“Talk about discrimination. If it’s good enough for the convention center to set up its own rules, why not for the private workplace?” Hughes asked after the meeting.

Hughes favors adoption of voluntary, not mandatory, smoking controls, as the Orange County Board of Supervisors has done.

Mayor Pro Tem Irv Pickler disagreed, saying the suggestion that the city follow the county’s example is not good enough. The county doesn’t “know if it’s going to work,” he said.

Mayor Don Roth responded, “You don’t know if it (a voluntary program) is going to work unless you try it.”

But, Pickler insisted, “I don’t think we can wait that long. . . . I think we need to do something immediately. I don’t think we can wait anymore.”