Some Would Rather Fight Than Switch to Smoking Ban : Tobacco: California’s tough new workplace law touches off both rebellions and philosophical acceptance.

Inside her El Segundo office, Cindy Mortesen snapped her purse shut only seconds after reaching for a cigarette Tuesday, remembering it was 1995--a year of infamy for California’s smokers.

The state’s 4-day-old anti-smoking law, one of the strongest in the nation, bans lighting up in most indoor workplaces, including restaurants.

“I could get real cranky over this,” said Mortesen, El Segundo’s city clerk, who by noon had already stepped outside City Hall once for a couple of quick drags on a cigarette. “Smokers are losing more and more rights.”

Although Los Angeles restricted indoor smoking on the job a decade ago, dozens of smaller cities from Artesia to Santa Fe Springs had never posed an obstacle to lighting up. Unlike their Los Angeles counterparts, smokers in these towns had maintained their dignity; they’d never had to huddle outside, cowering for shelter from wind and rain as they smoked.

No more.

Mortesen and many other smokers on Tuesday tried to take the change in stride as they returned to their workplaces despite the glee of their nonsmoking colleagues.

“This will probably help me in a long run because maybe I can actually quit,” said Mortesen, who has smoked for 20 years. “Either that, or you’ll see headlines: ‘City Clerk Kills for Cigarettes.’ ”

The new law does permit smoking in bars or outdoor areas, unless prohibited by a local smoking ban. However, it will ban smoking in bars in two years. Business owners who flout the law can be fined $100 for the first violation and larger fines for subsequent ones.

Before Gov. Pete Wilson signed the law in July, about 100 of California’s cities, or 20%, had some kind of smoking restrictions. In Los Angeles County, 45 of 88 cities already had smoking regulations in place. Los Angeles, West Hollywood and Whittier, for instance, required smoke-free restaurants. No city, however, had flatly banned smoking in the workplace, though many--such as Los Angeles--required companies to provide smoke-free work areas for employees.

In response to the change, some ordinarily law-abiding citizens pledged revolt Tuesday. They would eat at home rather than be denied their cigarettes at a restaurant table, they said. They would light up anyway. They would allow their customers to indulge in their tobacco habit. They would still provide ashtrays.

In the small South Bay city of El Segundo, where residents had never been hampered by municipal smoking restrictions, dozens swore defiance.

At Wendy’s Place, a small cafe whose walls are decorated with Norman Rockwell jigsaw puzzles, proprietor Wendy Wallace said she had no intention of removing the sign posted outside reading: “This Is a Smoking Establishment.”

“I believe in freedom of choice and I am giving people a choice right there at the door,” said Wallace, who is a smoker. “I don’t believe you should push what you believe onto other people.”

Many others in El Segundo promised they would not be cowed by the law.

“I don’t think anyone can tell me what to do, no one can tell me not to smoke,” bank manager Mary Mahlke, 48, said.

Others said that the restriction posed just one more obstacle to running a successful business during what are already tough economic days.

“I can’t afford to tell customers not to smoke in here as bad as times are,” hairdresser Sally Biller said.

“I’m not going to play policeman for someone’s stupid smoking law,” added Gene Cangro, a liquor store manager.

Although anti-smoking advocates have maintained that about 53,000 nonsmokers in the United States die of lung cancer and other diseases caused by secondhand smoke every year, some people said they deserve the freedom to enjoy the vice of their choice.

“Why not regulate places that sell greasy red meat because we all know that can damage your arteries?” said Lt. Roger Stephenson of the El Segundo Police Department.

In other cities, smokers dug in their heels. Smoking became a point of honor; a cigarette was transformed into a badge of independence.

At Zingo’s Cafe and Lounge, a longtime Bakersfield truck stop, the ban prompted an impromptu smoke-in of sorts. Manager Donna Pruitt said that on Sunday, the day the law went into effect, she led her customers in a protest, lighting up one of her own Benson & Hedges Deluxe Ultra-Lites.

“This guy said to me, ‘Donna, what are we gonna do?’ And I said, ‘I don’t know--gimme a cigarette,’ ” Pruitt laughed. “After that, everyone just fired up. And when I came to work today, they were all out there smokin’. Way I figure it, I’m legal. I have signs posted. I done my part. But I’m not gonna tell people not to smoke. Some of these truckers are pretty good-sized and I’m only 5-foot-1.”

Not everyone was belligerent. In Kingsburg, a little town south of Fresno with a water tower shaped like a big Swedish coffeepot, Dan Harrell, proprietor of Kady’s Kitchen, said his customers have taken the change in good humor.

“Everyone kind of knew it was coming, so there’s been no big reaction,” Harrell said. “They’re not smoking. On the other hand, they’re not sitting in the restaurant as long as they used to either.”

For those few subcultures that seemed beyond the reach of the health-conscious, the new law raised grave concerns. Take, for instance, bowling alleys, where according to national surveys 45% of league bowlers smoke.

Rather than quit smoking, some bowlers--including Sandy Tilman of Orange--threaten to quit bowling. For Tilman, 43, the bowling alley was her sole refuge. Only there was she free from the smoking bans that forbade her to light up--a privilege she was denied by movie theaters and some of her favorite restaurants.

The bowling alley was “the last place we have left to go for a night out to socialize,” Tilman said.

“I’m sure people are scared to death,” said Darold Dobs, executive director of the American Bowling Congress in Greendale, Wis.

At Premier Lanes in Santa Fe Springs, manager Gil Martinez said several bowlers had already quit.

“I keep saying it’s not us, it’s the state,” said Martinez, 31. “Our hands are tied. What else can we do?”

As darkness fell Tuesday in another part of Santa Fe Springs, Gary Annis, 49, a trucker from Iowa, described his introduction to the new law. He’d been having breakfast at a familiar cafe and was taking a cigarette out of the pack when the waitress asked him to put it back, warning of the $100 fine.

Annis wasn’t mad, just philosophical.

“It’s an inconvenience,” he said. “I don’t think my cigarette smoke is any more offensive than a lady who’s wearing offensive perfume. I’m from the Midwest, where the air is clean, there is no smog, we can breathe in the morning and we can have our cigarettes.”

Times staff writers Shawn Hubler and Don Lee contributed to this story.