Limits Sought on Cigarette Sales From Vending Machines : Thousand Oaks: Mayor Jaime Zukowski wants to restrict access by minors at hotels, motels and office buildings.

Standing between the soda and snack machines on the enclosed part of the pool deck at a Thousand Oaks motel is a cigarette machine.

Anyone with $2.75 worth of quarters and standing tall enough to reach the buttons--about three feet off the ground--can purchase a pack.

Such easy access to cigarettes is an open invitation to minors, Thousand Oaks Mayor Jaime Zukowski said.

At tonight’s City Council meeting, Zukowski will seek to limit youth access to cigarettes with a proposal to ban cigarette vending machines everywhere except at bars.

“It is a manner by which minors do get cigarettes, which are considered an entry to other unhealthful things, such as marijuana,” Zukowski said. “Vending machines are not always in a place where there is a responsible person present.”

According to the American Lung Assn., the easiest way for minors to buy cigarettes is through vending machines, where more than half the minors who smoke make their purchases.

Hotels and motels are among the few places besides bars where people can still buy cigarettes from a vending machine in Thousand Oaks. Other places include office buildings.

Sari Seppa, general manager of the Thousand Oaks Inn, said the security staff tries to keep an eye on the motel’s vending machine, which was inherited from Howard Johnson’s when the motel took over the chain’s building in 1994.

However, she acknowledges that it isn’t always easy.

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Regardless of the council’s vote, Seppa said she plans to take the machine out soon because people just aren’t smoking as much. “I’ve had more complaints about the machine not working than I have about kids buying cigarettes,” she said. “I do it mainly as a courtesy to our customers. It is not a revenue-generator for us.”

John Levine, area manager of the vending machine company T. D. Rowe, said Thousand Oaks’ plan to limit vending machines will have little effect on him. Most of his business is in bars, but he does provide vending machines to three motels in Thousand Oaks.

“In Thousand Oaks, I’ve already been through this once,” said Levine, who has taken out 15 cigarette vending machines in the city in the past year. The City Council last year cracked down on smoking in public places and restaurants without an enclosed smoking area.

As a result, vendors had to remove machines from coffee shops and restaurants without clearly defined bars or smoking rooms.

“This time around isn’t really a big deal, but it’s part of a whole bigger picture that affects vending machine companies,” Levine said.

Zukowski said the crackdown on machines comes as the city examines the effect of its smoking ordinance a year after it was passed. She said the city also supports state legislation that would require vending machines to be at least 15 feet away from the entrance of a bar.

Camarillo is the only other city in Ventura County that bans vending machines outside bars. The City Council adopted the restriction last year as part of its crackdown on smoking in restaurants and other public places.

Cities with similar bans on vending machines include Santa Monica and Carpinteria.