Smoke Gets in Their Eyes : School board, though with understandable zeal, goes overboard

There’s mounting evidence that secondhand smoke, or smoke inhaled from others’ smoking, is a major health hazard. And there’s no doubt that we would all be better off if no one smoked. But some people persist; that’s why most work sites have designated areas to try to keep the contact between smokers and nonsmokers to a minimum.

But the Los Angeles Unified School District’s new anti-smoking policy is unenforceable and may inadvertently send the wrong sort of message to schoolchildren.

Students, of course, have long been prohibited from smoking on campus. The new board policy would ban smoking for everyone on all district property or at any district-sponsored event. Until now, schools have established their own designated smoking areas, never in classrooms, of course, and away from children.

At school, where young opinions are formed, the symbolism of an act is nearly as important as the act itself. No doubt the board wants the children to get the idea that smoking is a bad and harmful habit.

But what message will the children get when a rule is made and then consistently broken? What happens when a maintenance worker smokes in a school truck, and the rules say that isn’t permitted?

When a smoking teacher or office worker decides to stand on the sidewalk outside the school fence to smoke--perhaps in full view of the children--during recess? Is the school district going to force everyone in its environs to quit smoking simply by fiat, or is it just going to force them to sneak around to do it?

The district’s intent is honorable: Smoking must be discouraged and nonsmokers must be protected from being forced to inhale others’ smoke. That’s a good argument for banning smoking in enclosed public space and setting up tight workplace restrictions that allow smoking only in designated, separate areas.

Some people unfortunately continue to smoke. But the district should not mandate inflexible rules that are bound to be broken so children can see firsthand that school rules are easy to get around.