Debate Heats Up Over Initiative on Smoking

Although Proposition 188 has been virtually eclipsed by the national notoriety of Proposition 187, its neighbor on the statewide ballot, the measure to repeal California’s restrictions on smoking has still managed to stir passions.

In Orange County, the proposition is pitting smokers against nonsmokers and health groups against restaurant owners amid controversial scientific findings that secondhand smoke can cause cancer and birth defects.

Health concerns aside, the debate also focuses on whether state lawmakers should have the power to determine smoking policies inside privately owned businesses and the workplace. Some health officials in Orange County think so. Some local restaurant owners think not.

If approved, the tobacco industry-backed initiative would repeal the statewide ban on smoking in the workplace--scheduled to take effect next year--and give business owners the ability to choose whether they want to create limited smoking sections.

It would also repeal all local and state regulations, undoing tough anti-smoking ordinances in some South County cities, where tobacco vending machines are banned and puffing is prohibited in at least 75% of the floor space in all restaurants.

“We might even see an increase in death in the county,” said Jim Nethery, chairman of the Tobacco Use Prevention Coalition for Orange County. “I think it’s sick that these carpetbaggers from North Carolina can come in and run the state and ram any legislation they want down our throats. But then again, they’ve always controlled smoking issues in the Legislature.”

Nonsense, says Dan Marcheano, owner of the Arches, a restaurant in Newport Beach, where smoking is allowed.

“If somebody walks into a restaurant and is surrounded by smoke, they have every right to walk out,” he said. “But the state is trying to take that right away from us. The state can’t balance the budget, it can’t handle crime or the illegal immigration or clean up the air outside. And now it wants to take on smoking indoors? This should be between the consumer and the operator.”

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Costa Mesa Councilman Jay Humphrey argues that Proposition 188 is an attack on local law.

“People should vote against Proposition 188 because it abrogates local law,” he said. “Whatever happened to the one-man, one-vote (provision)? I thought that’s what democracy was all about--having the public involved with the decision process.”

Already, the possibility of the initiative’s passage has postponed a City Council vote in Yorba Linda, which was considering adopting an ordinance banning smoking in restaurants.

“It’s getting to the point where many cities think it’s silly to pass an ordinance that will only be reversed in the next two months,” says Phil Falcetti, a prevention specialist for the Orange County Health Care Agency, which helps cities prepare health care-related ordinances.

Lida Lenney, a Laguna Beach council member, said if Proposition 188 passes, the city’s anti-smoking efforts in the last four years will be extinguished--including the ban on tobacco vending machines in town and on smoking in all restaurants, starting next year.

And Laguna Beach isn’t alone. Huntington Beach, Dana Point, Laguna Hills, San Juan Capistrano and Santa Ana have passed similar anti-smoking ordinances banning either cigarette vending machines or smoking in restaurants that will face reversal if the measure is approved.

Proposition 188 “takes control out of the hands of the local community,” Lenney said. “I just hope people can read through it, and realize that it is backed by the tobacco industry.”

The initiative, known as the California Uniform Tobacco Control Act, would regulate smoking statewide and create a uniform law, said Lee Stitzenberger, the campaign director for Californians for Statewide Smoking Restrictions, a backer of the initiative.

“The current climate in California is that there are 300 different ordinances on smoking and it’s just too confusing,” Stitzenberger said. “You can cross the street in Anaheim and face different laws in Garden Grove; you can cross the street in Los Angeles and face a different set of rules in Beverly Hills. We think your rights should be the same whether you’re a smoker or a nonsmoker.”

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Proposition 188 would give private businesses the right to choose whether to establish smoking in lounges, cafeterias, private offices, conference rooms or company cars. It would let restaurant owners decide whether they want to designate 25% of their space as smoking sections, provided they meet ventilation standards, which are set by the American Society of Heating and Refrigeration and enforced by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration.

The initiative also would permit bars, restaurants and liquor stores and any other businesses to bring back vending machines in cities where they are currently banned, as long as they are placed in supervised areas.

“The bottom line is businesses have the right to make a conscious choice,” Stitzenberger said. “But they also have the absolute right to deny smoking.”

But health groups and anti-smoking advocates claim more people will be exposed to secondhand smoke because ventilation standards will never be met, and that the initiative will turn back the progress gained in the last decade since secondhand smoke was identified by the U.S. surgeon general in 1984 as a carcinogen.