Bill Implementing Tobacco Initiative Goes to Governor

Ten months after passage of Proposition 99, the anti-smoking tobacco tax initiative, the Senate and Assembly Thursday sent Gov. George Deukmejian a $1.5-billion bill implementing the measure on back-to-back lopsided votes.

Lobbyists and officials from counties, medical organizations and other health groups that backed Proposition 99 whooped and cheered in the hall outside the Assembly chamber moments after the measure won final legislative approval on a 68-2 vote. Earlier, the Senate had approved the Proposition 99 implementation bill by a 38-0 vote.

Deukmejian is expected to sign the bill.

The impromptu celebration by health advocates allowed a release of tension that had built up during weeks of intense bargaining by lawmakers and a threat to the bill posed by a last-minute lobbying effort by the tobacco industry. The lobbying effort keyed on a provision of the bill that directs $28.6 million over two years into an anti-smoking television and print advertising campaign aimed at California’s youth.

Tobacco companies, said to be fearful that a television ad campaign would persuade more Californians to give up smoking, hoped to delete the provision from the bill. They won some allies in the Legislature, including Senate Republican Leader Ken Maddy of Fresno, who said he opposed using any of the advertising money for television ads because he did not think mass advertising was the best way to reach smokers.

Maddy, who had dropped his objections Wednesday, carried the bill on the Senate floor. He said numerous compromises were made by lawmakers. But he said the overall benefits of the bill overrode objections to individual parts. “When you have $1.5 billion to give away you usually can find room for accommodations,” he said.

The $1.5 billion contained in the bill represents 2 1/2 years worth of money raised by the tobacco tax increases mandated by Proposition 99. The measure caused cigarette taxes to go up 25 cents a pack and resulted in comparable increases to other tobacco products, like cigars. The initiative directed that most of the money be used to finance health programs for the poor.

County hospitals, emergency centers and health programs for the indigent will get the lion’s share of the money. Los Angeles County government’s share of the pie will amount to about $350 million over the 2 1/2-year life of the bill.