Funds OKd to Fight Smoking

Brushing aside concerns that the money should be saved for Los Angeles County’s looming health crisis, the Board of Supervisors on Tuesday approved $3.5 million in anti-tobacco spending.

Four supervisors relied on medical officials’ arguments that the money would combat smoking and therefore keep health costs lower in the future. But the lone opponent, Supervisor Gloria Molina, said she was alarmed that her colleagues wanted to continue a well-intentioned program given the $1-billion deficit that their health department soon will face.

The money will go to groups in the supervisors’ districts for various measures to discourage smoking.

“While there’s a lot of money being spent with all these organizations and some of them are doing a good job, priority of priorities, this is not a good use of dollars,” Molina said, noting that hospitals and clinics may be closed in coming years.

The money comes from the county’s share of the global settlement of various lawsuits against the tobacco industry. Last year, supervisors agreed to spend $60 million of that annually on patching up their health department’s mammoth deficit, which is expected to swell to $1 billion by 2005, when federal aid dries up. But the board kept $40 million available to spend on politically popular smoking prevention programs.

They allocated $7 million toward those last year and $12 million this year. Tuesday’s contracts with 33 community organizations represent about a quarter of that $12 million.

Molina was the only supervisor to vote against the contracts. She also was the lone supervisor to object to taking steps toward expanding three county hospitals earlier this month, citing the health deficit.

Molina has been on the losing end of votes on another health matter--the shrinking of County-USC Medical Center in her district. Her colleagues said that hospital needed to be smaller because of the deficit.