Many bar and restaurant owners may be forced to choose between smokers and families with children under changes to the proposed statewide indoor smoking ban.
While the Georgia Senate passed a ban on smoking in most public buildings, a House committee voted last Tuesday to allow smoking in bars and restaurants if the minimum age for entry is 18 years old.
The full House must now debate the issue.
The exemption to the ban could create a dilemma for restaurants that include bars. In order to allow smoking, owners would have to turn away those under 18.
Restaurant owner Cesare Mammarella only allows smoking in the bar sections of the Tic-Toc Room and Luigi’s Bistro on Cherry Street. Luigi’s Bistro on Northside Drive is already a complete no-smoking restaurant, he said, but that doesn’t mean he favors the ban.
“Cigarettes are legal,” Mammarella said. “I know it’s a whole health thing, but it’s too much government in my business.”
If the current smoking proposal is approved, he has a tough decision to make.
“If I had a choice, I’d probably do 18 and over (at Tic-Toc),” Mammarella said.
He would likely make Luigi’s on Cherry Street another no-smoking restaurant rather than turn families away, he said.
Smoking is already banned in DeKalb County where Mammarella owns The Cabin Room restaurant. If someone is caught smoking there, the citation goes to the smoker, not the owner, he said.
“So who’s going to enforce it?” Mammarella asked.
The owner of The Rookery, Jim Kee, also has enforcement questions.
“I want to have smoking available to my customers,” Kee said. “But to have them make us be a watchdog making sure we don’t have anyone under 18, that means I’m working for the government.”
Kee said they don’t have too many children coming into the restaurant, but he wouldn’t want to turn any of them away.
The law would likely force Steve and Brian Kipper of Warner Robins to split their businesses between smoking and nonsmoking. The two own Beef O’Brady’s, a sports bar franchise geared toward families, and their own restaurant/bar, Kipper’s Sports Grill, which is geared toward adults.
Steve Kipper said his initial reaction to the legislation in the house is that it would likely mean Beef O’Brady’s would go smokeless, even though it was designed to allow a smoking section away from the family-oriented dining area.
“So much of our business is based on the families, we would almost have to choose nonsmoking,” Steve Kipper said.
Brian Kipper said that he was against the plan in the Senate that would ban smoking areas and would prefer a law that would only require restaurants to post signs stating the restaurant’s smoking policy, leaving people a choice.
“We understand the health concerns associated with smoking, but we think that adults should be allowed to make their own decisions about using a legal product, just as they are allowed to with alcohol,” Brian Kipper said.
The law that would give restaurants the choice to be a restaurant and cater to families, or be a bar and cater to adults would be his preference between the Senate and House versions of the bill, Brian Kipper said.
Buffalo’s Southwest Cafe in Warner Robins would take a hit in the 18-and-over bill; general manager Tim Denton said that because the restaurant caters to families it would mean that smokers would have to be pushed outdoors.
“We’d probably have to have nonsmoking in the restaurant and build a bigger deck,” Denton said.
At Ingleside Village Pizza, owner Tina Dickson restricted smoking to the counter when she remodeled the restaurant about five years ago, she said.
“I will never say kids 18 and under can’t come in,” Dickson said. “I’m a family restaurant. I love my families.”
Part of the reason Dickson kept a small smoking section is to cater to smoking employees, she said.
The House committee changes would allow businesses to create indoor employee smoking lounges with a separate ventilation system, if nonsmokers did not have to enter them during the normal course of business.
At Jocks & Jills, smoking is currently restricted to the bar, said general manager Jon Paxton.
“We’re hoping we’ll be able to keep it the same because the bar and the bistro area is separate,” Paxton said. “We have ceilings probably 15 to 20 feet tall so we hardly ever get complaints.”
Paxton would prefer that legislatures not make any laws that infringe on people’s rights, but is prepared to adjust to proposed changes.
If the law will not allow smoking in the bar, Paxton said he will convert the outside patio to a smoking section.
“You don’t want to upset or lose any customers, so we’ll try to do what we can,” he said.
Originally written By: Liz Fabian
Telegraph Staff Writer
