Londonderry Update
Londonderry smoking ban is ‘out of control’
November 24, 2006
The smoking ban just imposed by Londonderry, N.H.’s Town Council isn’t about public health. It is little more than posturing – an effort by councilors to be dramatic about their disapproval of smoking.
The ban doesn’t cover just the inside of public buildings. It forbids smoking within 20 feet of the doorways and entrance gates of any town property. In other words, it bans smoking outside – even at the entrance of the Musquash conservation area.
This is ludicrous. Yes, smoking is a dirty, expensive and unhealthy habit. Yes, second-hand smoke is a threat to the health of others within a confined space. It is justifiable to ban it inside public buildings. But it remains a legal product. If councilors are that concerned about it being a threat to public health, why don’t they launch a campaign to ban the use of tobacco altogether?
To claim it is a threat outdoors ought to embarrass them. Auto exhaust is unhealthy as well. If people breathe those fumes in a confined space, it will kill them much more quickly than tobacco smoke will. So, is the council’s next step to ban all motor vehicles from public property? Councilors have said they don’t want to be “accosted” by smoke as they walk along the sidewalk. So, why should they or their constituents be “accosted” by auto exhaust?
There are genuine threats to public health, and second-hand smoke inside buildings is one of them. Outdoors it is not. Londonderry state Rep. Al Baldasaro was understating the case when he said it such a ban was, “a little out of control.”
It is a lot out of control. It ought to be rescinded.
Townwide smoking ban takes matters too far
October 25, 2006
Here’s an odd scenario: If some Londonderry, N.H., town councilors have their way and enact a smoking ban on all town-owned property, it would be legal to smoke inside a Londonderry restaurant but illegal to smoke on the sidewalk outside it.
That doesn’t make much sense. Councilor Mark Oswald’s proposal to ban smoking on all town-owned property is an example of local government reaching far beyond its mandate.
Oswald casts his idea for a smoking ban as a matter of public health and safety. But Oswald’s comments in news stories suggest he just doesn’t care for the habit or for smokers who gather outside establishments where smoking is prohibited. Oswald dislikes having to pass by such people.
“I don’t need to be accosted by smoke,” he said.
Councilor Tom Dolan supports the idea.
There are many things in life that people do not care for but tolerate for the sake of living in a free society. Folks generally recognize that the choices they make may not be the ones others would prefer. There’s a need in a civil society to tolerate other people’s behaviors, as long as they do not break the law.
Smoking remains legal for adults everywhere in the United States. Smoking indeed is an unhealthy habit that is the leading cause of a number of life-threatening diseases. Those who smoke would be healthier if they were to quit.
But smoking remains a personal choice.
The New Hampshire Senate in April rejected by one vote a proposal for a statewide ban on smoking in all restaurants. There is at least some logic to a ban on smoking in enclosed facilities such as restaurants. Patrons have no means of avoiding cigarette smoke other than to leave the premises. Employees are confined within the smoky environment for the duration of their shifts.
But there are no such limitations on those who wish to avoid cigarette smoke outdoors.
Londonderry’s current ban on smoking on school property makes sense. It is illegal for children purchase cigarettes and wrong for them to take up an adult habit at an immature age. But extending that ban to all town property, as Oswald proposes, is overreaching.
A townwide ban on smoking is more of an insult to personal freedom and choice than it is a benefit to public health.
