Indianapolis Update
Where there’s a new smoking ban, there’s confusion
April 3, 2006
Brendan O’Shaughnessy
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There have been no fines so far, but health officials fielded 71 complaints in the first month of the city’s smoking ban and issued eight violation warnings.
The biggest factor has been confusion over the ban’s rules, not die-hard smokers trying to skirt the restrictions.
“Everyone has been very cooperative,” said Ed Culver, the Marion County Health Department’s food safety administrator and the man charged with enforcing the ban in restaurants.
In a few situations, managers didn’t seem to understand what was allowed and what was not, he said. But those were easily cleared up, he said, sometimes just by putting up a sign for smoking establishments.
The department can issue tickets of $100 or $200 to violators but will give one warning before issuing a ticket.
Of the 71 complaints, 41 were about smoking at workplaces or other public areas covered by the ban. The 30 others were against places that served food.
Nine of those turned out to be exempt from the ban. Some were among about 340 taverns electing to close their doors to minors. Others were in cities such as Beech Grove that were excluded from the City-County Council ordinance, which took effect March 1.
Culver said about 10 establishments’ status is still uncertain because officials have not been able to review their request to allow smoking.
Of the eight citations issued, one for St. Elmo Steak House in Downtown Indianapolis on March 18 illustrated how a mistake can result in a violation.
General manager Chris Clifford said he ordered a sidewalk tent for a private party that wanted smoking. The rental company accidentally put walls on the tent, but the law says an exterior tent may not have more than two walls.
Clifford was not working that day, he said. No one noticed the mistake until Monday, when the Health Department inspected.
Move on to extend smoking ban to all
January 27, 2006
Will Higgins
Councilman calls ordinance unfair as is, but not everyone agrees
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A month before the city’s anti-smoking ordinance is scheduled to kick in, a City-County Council member is working quietly to toughen it.
How ban will work
Under the ban: Beginning March 1, smoking will be banned in workplaces, coin-operated laundries, lobbies, restrooms and other public areas. The ban covers restaurants and bars unless they prohibit customers younger than 18, in which case they are exempt.
Excused from the ban: Bowling alleys, private clubs, cigar bars, retail tobacco stores, designated hotel smoking rooms and family-owned businesses in which all employees are related and the business is closed to the public.
Democrat Ron Gibson hopes to gather enough votes to add an amendment that would ban smoking outright in all restaurants with liquor licenses. Gibson says he already has the support of five or six council members, a third of the way to mustering a majority.
One sticking point would be how the change could affect bars. There is no definition of what makes a place a bar rather than a restaurant.
As it is written now, the ordinance scheduled to go into effect March 1 would ban smoking in establishments that allow patrons younger than 18. That leaves many restaurant operators facing the choice of whether to shun kids or smokers.
Larry Griggers, the managing partner and majority owner of Indianapolis’ two Ruth’s Chris steakhouse franchises, had decided to ban smoking and keep children. But he feared he’d lose business to competitors that allowed smoking.
“The law today is unfair, because it would displace revenue from one place to another,” Griggers said. He was worried enough to poll nearly two dozen restaurants. Griggers said he found they’d rather have a broader ban than try to choose one kind of customer over another. Then he approached Gibson with his idea for an amended statute.
Last year, as the City-County Council considered restricting smoking in public places, the hospitality industry was united in opposing any statute as unwanted government intrusion.
But now, with the amended version in the wings, it’s pitting brother against brother.
Hal Yeagy, owner of the Downtown Indianapolis blues club Slippery Noodle, planned to keep smokers and ban kids.
“Almost all my business is adults,” he said, “and at night, I’d say 70 percent of my customers smoke. My cigarette machine does $40,000 a year.”
But the Noodle serves lunch and dinner, and to Gibson, it’s not a bar, it’s a restaurant. Under his amendment, Yeagy would have no choice: Smoking would be banned.
So Yeagy is against the proposal.
Brad Klopfenstein, executive director of the Indiana Licensed Beverage Association, a statewide consortium of bars and restaurants, called Gibson’s plan “anti-business” and vowed to fight it.
Opinions are so divided, though, that the Restaurant and Hospitality Association of Indiana is not taking a position.
“Some of our members are for (Gibson’s plan), some are against it,” said John Livengood, president of the association.
In seeking an across-the-board ban, Gibson said he aimed “to make the dining experience healthier for our families” and to “level the playing field” for the restaurants.
He hopes to keep bars out of the debate, but the odds of that seem long without a clear definition of what constitutes a bar.
“That’s going to be the big question,” he said. “I’m working on a definition, but I think we’ll need to get lawyers involved.”
Gibson added that he would not offer the amendment until he had enough support to pass it. “Right now, it’s theoretical.”
In May 2005, when the City-County Council passed the smoking ordinance, Indianapolis became one of a growing number of cities to restrict smoking. Bloomington, Carmel, Fort Wayne and Greenfield have banned or restricted smoking in restaurants.
Preparations for Smoking Ban in Indianapolis Demonstrate that New Law is Not an Appropriate Public Health Policy
As the article explains: “County eateries face tough choice: comply with ordinance or limit customer base. … area restaurants, most of which will become smoke-free under the ban, are wrestling with whether to limit dining choices for families in order to be exempted from the policy. ‘That’s the decision everybody is trying to make. That’s the tough part of it,’ said Chad Ashley, general manager of Rock Bottom Restaurant and Brewery in Downtown Indianapolis.”
The Rest of the Story
Regardless of what one believes about the health effects of secondhand smoke or the need to protect restaurant workers from this hazard, it seems to me that everyone should agree that the Indianapolis approach to address this problem makes no sense, from any rational point of view.
First of all, if secondhand smoke is so hazardous that restaurant workers need protection, then what possible sense does it make to protect only workers in restaurants that serve children, not adults?
Second of all, if secondhand smoke is so hazardous that the government must come in and tell business owners what they must do, then what sense does it make to force these owners to make a decision about whether to allow children or allow smoking, rather than to simply determine a health policy for the city’s workplaces?
And third of all, if secondhand smoke is not hazardous enough to warrant eliminating it in restaurants, then what possible sense does it make to intervene so intrusively with the way in which businesses are operated in the city – to the extent that the city is now regulating the clientele that establishments in the city may entertain?
Because this policy is completely irrational, I believe it has no public health justification.
As I stated back in May: “what we actually have here is a measure enacted in the name of protecting the public’s health which has no public health justification, which offers no guaranteed public health protection to anyone – customers or workers – and which will likely result in markedly increased exposure to secondhand smoke for a large group of workers: those employed in establishments that are, or decide to become, adult-only restaurants or bars.”
I think that smoke-free advocates in Indiana have significantly set back national efforts to protect workers from secondhand smoke. As I stated earlier about the Indianapolis law: “This completely undermines the national clean indoor air movement, by framing secondhand smoke as a hazard only insofar as it potentially affects the health and/or comfort of kids.”
If secondhand smoke is so severe a problem that the government has to intervene into the way businesses are operated, then get rid of it. If secondhand smoke is not so bad a problem that adults need to be protected at all, then leave the poor business owners alone!
Mayor Peterson Signs Smoking Ban Ordinance
June 2, 2005,
(Indianapolis) – It was months in the making. Mayor Bart Peterson put pen to paper Thursday, making most Indy businesses and public buildings smoke-free.
The Mayor says the ordinance is good for the health of Hoosiers. Health leaders estimate second-hand smoke kills 250 non-smokers in Marion County every year. Bars, taverns, and bowling alleys, and private clubs are exempt.
The ordinance goes into effect March 1, 2006.
http://www.wishtv.com/Global/story.asp?S=3423848&nav;=0Ra7aaUf
More Lenient Smoking Ban Gets New Life
May 17, 2005
By Anthony Ponce
24 Hour News 8
(Marion County) – A week after being extinguished, a new smoking ordinance for Indianapolis is back on the table and is expected to pass.
The new smoking ban is more lenient than the original proposal and its subsequent revisions. One key difference has to do with entrances to the work place. As of last week, smokers would not have been able to smoke within ten feet of an entrance.? Now that rule and others are gone.
When first introduced, the ordinance would have banned smoking in almost all public places: bars, restaurants, parks, and the workplace. That turned out to be too extreme to pass the city-county council, so it was drastically scaled back. The next version exempted bars and restaurants if they were over 21, and almost all outdoor places were let off the hook.
That measure was still defeated last week by three votes when it was sent back to committee. Council President Steve Talley says this week is different.
“We came up with some of the provisions that would satisfy some of the other councilors and now they’ve agreed to that they’d support it with some of these changes, so I think that now it will be overwhelmingly approved by the council,” said Talley.
The changes include exempting bowling alleys and exempting bars and restaurants if they go “18 and up” instead of 21, and instead of taking effect October 1st, compliance wouldn’t start until March 1st of 2006.?
Another thing scrapped from this most recent version is the so-called ten-foot rule, which would have banned smoking within ten feet of a restaurant door. Now people would be able to smoke anywhere outside the restaurant.
“I think you can sit outside and be okay next to smoker. Being in the open air, it dissipates cigarette smoke pretty well,” said Billy Hannan.
Talley says the newly revised measure should pass out of committee on Thursday and have enough votes in the full council, so we could see a new smoking ordinance passed as early as next Tuesday.
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http://www.wishtv.com/Global/story.asp?S=3355478&nav;=CPFRZxFx
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Fatally flawed, the smoking ban got what it deserved
May 12, 2005
Ruth Holladay
The idea, said Lincoln Plowman, was to show other City-County Council members how a workingman lives.
“I wanted to get ’em out of the ivory tower,” explained the freshman Republican, a lieutenant in the Marion County Sheriff’s Department. So the Southsider invited council members to join him at a Westside country bar, a Downtown Greek restaurant, a nightclub or two, and lunch joints all around Indy.
The result was an up-close look at small eateries, bars and nightspots where some patrons, heaven forbid, smoke — and where owners believe that a proposed smoking ban would ruin them financially.
The sort of spadework Plowman did, plus plenty of digging in by the liquor and restaurant industries, is what buried the city’s proposed smoking ban.
That, and the fact that the ban was over the top.
The measure was shelved Monday when the council voted 16-13 to send it back to the Children’s Health and Environment Committee for “more study.”
Score one for the champions of individual freedom and the marketplace. The nanny state lost this round.
No matter what you think about smoking — and only a Neanderthal would defend it as a responsible habit — the council vote demonstrated what opponents knew: The heavy-handed ban had lawsuit written all over it.
Basically, the ban had four flaws, said John Livengood, president of the Restaurant & Hospitality Association of Indiana, and Mark C. Webb, an attorney who represents the liquor industry:
? The language was vague about which restaurants and taverns would be exempted. All restaurants that “primarily serve food” would be under the ban. So what about places that serve food by day, then switch to booze sales from 8 p.m. to 3 a.m. or so? They’d have to go smoke-free — and could lose their biggest income base.
? Restaurants (or anyplace selling more food than alcohol) with customers under 21 would go smoke-free — which left no allowances for eateries with bars. Under Indiana law, 18-year-olds, accompanied by a parent or guardian, can eat in bar areas in restaurants. The ban would ban them — yet they can vote, marry, be drafted and smoke.
? The ban prohibited outdoor smoking within 10 feet of a smoke-free establishment. That made it very difficult for restaurants with outdoor tables because many sidewalks don’t allow for that much buffer space.
? The ban would hurt the heavy hitters. The restaurant and hotel industry pays a 1 percent tax to the Capital Improvement Board. That may go to 2 percent to build a new Colts stadium. “Last year these guys coughed up $16 million to the CIB,” said Webb. “Then it’s 2 percent, but they can’t market to their most profitable customers. It’s like sending them to do battle with one arm tied behind their backs.”
The ban was “an absolute goose egg” to the St. Elmos of the city, he added — premier restaurants where smoking is limited but allowed.
Council member Angela Mansfield, a chief ban supporter, spent Wednesday working with the Greater Indianapolis Chamber of Commerce to make needed changes — basically, correcting the first three flaws.
Meanwhile, Lincoln Plowman took his wife out for dinner last week to her favorite Northside restaurant. When they were there a year ago, it had a smoking section. Now it’s smoke-free.
That, he said, is the way to get the job done — let the market decide.
Ruth Holladay’s column appears Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday. You can reach her at (317) 444-6405 or via e-mail at ruth.holladay@indystar.com.
http://www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2005505120443
Indy could loosen smoking ban restrictions
May 5, 2005
Alex Sanz/Eyewitness News
From the beginning, word spread, the city’s proposed smoking ban was among the toughest in the nation.
Cheryl Ann Matthews of Indianapolis feels, “We’re losing a lot of our freedom, a lot of our choice. We’re being dictated.”
The changes before the City-County Council’s Children’s Health and Environment Committee would make the proposed ban less restrictive, putting it in line with similar bans across the country.
Among the changes under consideration are:
Excluding bars that serve customers over 21 from the ban
Requiring signs that tell customers a building is not smoke-free
Exempting private clubs
Exempting all outdoor areas, including sports arenas and restaurant patios
The ban would take effect on October 1.
Indoors and outdoors, there are those who say fewer restrictions could translate into more council votes in favor of the ban.
City-County Councilman Greg Bowes says, “We’ve already gained more support just after trying to tell people the changes we’re offering tonight. We’ve gained more votes and we’re hoping the momentum will carry us through to a final vote.”
Supporters and opponents are keeping a close watch on what happens next.
After the City-County Council committee votes on the changes, the full council could vote on the ban as early as next week.
http://www.wthr.com/Global/story.asp?S=3305789
Debate Continues Over Smoking Ban
April 15, 2005
By Debby Knox
24 Hour News 8
(Indianapolis) – Residents heard emotional testimony Thursday night over the issue of a smoking ban for public places. A businessman who lost his wife to secondhand smoke took on the Chamber of Commerce.
With her portrait facing members of the committee, Bruce Hetrick spoke on his late wife’s behalf. “I would rather not be here today,” Hetrick said, launching into a gut-wrenching story about his wife and her battle with a cancer she never deserved.
“Forty days ago this night, just before she was supposed to begin her sixth round of cancer treatment, Pam collapsed and died in my arms,” said Hetrick.
Hetrick’s wife, Pamela Klein, died of a cancer that had spread from her mouth to her lungs. “My sixteen-year-old son had to call 911. He had to watch me try to revive his stepmom with mouth to mouth and CPR.”
“I have a request of this council to protect the health of citizens like Pam Klein. Add a smoking ban now.”
Chamber of Commerce board member Robert Brody also testified. He says he is personally opposed to smoking, but recognizes there are chamber members like restaurants and bars that need a law with exemptions.
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“The chamber is representing a compromise because there is a strong element in society that would argue that there are personal rights to be protected and there are economic interests and businesses to be protected,” said Brody.
The final decision may come next month. According to the council president, the chamber’s exemptions will probably win.
“What we’re hearing, we’re going to need to talk about making some adjustments in the proposal,” said Steve Talley, council president.
The exemptions would apply to private clubs or dedicated venues, like tobacco bars or cigarette stores.
Bruce Hetrick wants a full ban, but it appears that won’t happen.
http://www.wishtv.com/Global/story.asp?S=3215955&nav;=0Ra7YiVd
Indy’s smoking ban relaxed
[World News] INDIANAPOLIS, March 25, 2005
?A City-County Council committee in Indianapolis scaled down a proposed ban on smoking in public spaces.
The proposed smoking ban would have applied to public parks, bus stops, cab stands, the areas surrounding ATMs and anywhere food and drink are sold, the Indianapolis Star reported.
The ban is still in effect in outdoor arenas and restaurant seating areas that have partial covering, but a 50-foot no-smoking radius prescribed for public entrances to buildings was reduced to 10 feet.
http://www.newkerala.com
IN: Indianapolis. Smoking ban at city eateries proposed again.
