Exemptions in Smoking Law Rejected

The City Council refused to exclude pool halls, bowling alleys, bingo parlors and cocktail lounges from its list of places where smoking is prohibited, eliminating more of the few remaining refuges for people who want to light up in public.

A split Bellflower City Council this week refused to provide the additional exemptions to its recently approved no-smoking ordinance, the strictest in Southern California.

The ordinance, which was passed Jan. 14, prohibits smoking in restaurants and in most buildings to which the public has access. Bars, tobacco stores, private offices and residences and places of religious worship were exempted.

Such smokers’ bastions as bowling alleys, bingo parlors, small restaurants with cocktail lounges and pool halls had sought exemptions from the smoking ban, but the council turned them away by a 3-2 vote.

The smoking ban goes into effect March 5.

“They are going to kill us,” said Butch Jackson, an employee of Hard Times, the city’s only pool hall. “If they are going to do that, they may as well tell you not to drink or anything else.”

“One-hundred percent of anything is too much,” said Betty Goulding, the manager of Clark Center Bowl, the only bowling alley within the city’s limits. “I hope they realize they really created a monster.”

The council unanimously voted to ban smoking because it declared that the well-publicized effects of secondhand smoke posed a health threat to Bellflower residents.

Councilman Bob Stone, who introduced the smoking ban to the council in December, initially backed an ordinance that would allow the exemptions, arguing that, traditionally, many people who go to bowling alleys and pool halls smoke. He said that most nonsmokers are aware of that before they decide to patronize such places.

But after hearing testimony from several Bellflower business people and residents, Stone, along with Mayor Randy Bomgaars and Councilman Joseph E. Cvetko, voted against the exemptions.

“I feel that you’re sending out a mixed message,” one resident told the council.

“If it’s harmful in a restaurant, it’s harmful in a bowling alley,” another resident said. Bomgaars agreed: “If we are going to allow exemptions, I think we’re treading on thin ice. The statistics are there. Secondhand smoke is dangerous--it takes lives.”

Council members John Ansdell and William J. Pendleton voted to allow the exemptions.

“Smoke is smoke,” Pendleton said. “It doesn’t make any difference where it comes from. It all should go, but not at the expense of the bar trade.”

The smoking ban passed by the council earlier this month exempts bars or cocktail lounges where food preparation is secondary. The ban applies in cocktail lounges where full meals are served.

“This ordinance could put me out of business,” said Chuck Wells, the owner of Casa Grande, a Bellflower restaurant and cocktail lounge.

Wells, who has owned and operated his restaurant for the last 15 years, does not intend to give up.

“It’s 3 to 2,” he said. “There’s a chance (they’ll change their minds), and I’m going to keep going. It’s just not right.”

Tina Griego is a Times staff writer, and Mary Becker is a community correspondent.