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Opinion
Aug. 16, 2007
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

EDITORIAL: Ticketing smokers

Health district takes the wrong enforcement approach

So this 105-pound Southern Nevada Health District clerk walks into a bar and tells a tired, 265-pound, tattooed construction worker, 'You can't smoke in here. I'm citing you. That'll cost you $100 ...' "

It's not a joke. The Southern Nevada Health District is preparing to turn office staff into the Puff Patrol, a crack law enforcement squad charged with sniffing out violators of the Nevada Clean Indoor Air Act. The new law, approved by voters in November, prohibits smoking inside most businesses, including bars that serve food.

Because a Clark County district judge in December struck down the law's criminal penalties, the health district is the act's sole enforcing agency. Right now, the district does little beyond taking complaints from customers about businesses that unlawfully allow smoking on their premises, then dispatching inspectors accordingly.

But the district's lawyers are dotting the I's and crossing the T's on a plan to cite individual smokers, which would assess a $100 fine and put citizens before a justice of the peace if they want to contest the ticket.

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    • Which takes us back to our opening line.

    "We are not peace officers, yet we're in a bar and people are drinking," said health district attorney Stephen Minagil. "The health district staff writing these citations are scientists. They are environmental health specialists who are not armed. They don't have peace officer training."

    Without intending to do so, Mr. Minagil points out exactly why the health district has no business pursuing such a policy. If an individual smoker refuses to provide his identification, the health district officer's only recourse is to call police for assistance. And local cops don't have the manpower to uphold traffic laws in the valley, let alone respond to some bureaucrat's complaint that the guy two tables down is lighting up and won't put his cigarette out.

    In fact, Las Vegas police brass have made it abundantly clear that they have no intention of upholding the Clean Indoor Air Act. They'll provide backup to health district ticket writers only if the confrontation, initiated by the government employee, precipitates assault or battery -- or worse.

    In April 2003, two weeks after New York City's own anti-smoking ordinance went into effect, a bouncer at a Manhattan bar was stabbed to death after he asked two patrons to extinguish their cigarettes.

    Workers' personal safety concerns will inevitably lead to another problem for the health district: selective enforcement.

    Who is the aforementioned 105-pound "scientist" more likely to ticket, the 65-year-old woman with the oxygen tank or the beefy, 32-year-old ironworker? And where and when, exactly, will the Puff Patrol take to the streets? Will they hit upscale taverns in Summerlin or Green Valley during Thursday lunch, or biker bars on Boulder Highway at 2 a.m. Saturday?

    If health district workers plan to continue working their convenient day shifts, the answers are easy -- and unconstitutional.

    Already, the health district has shown a deficiency of common sense in upholding the Clean Indoor Air Act.

    Although the operators of Irene's Lounge, at 5480 W. Spring Mountain Road, constructed a wall separating its nonsmoking dining area from the bar to keep their kitchen open and comply with the law, inspectors dinged lounge employees for taking food orders in the bar and serving meals to bar patrons. Mr. Minagil won't drop the health district's civil lawsuit against Irene's Lounge until he's satisfied that employees are forcing bar patrons to enter the dining area, order their food, then bring it back to the bar themselves.

    Now that's a joke. The Clean Indoor Air Act was pitched to voters primarily as protection for "the children." But children aren't allowed in bars. What difference does it make if workers serve food in walled-off smoking areas where children aren't present? This kind of enforcement isn't about "the children," nor is it about preventing exposure to secondhand smoke. This is vindictive prohibition, plain and simple.

    Considering how reliant local and state governments are on jacked-up cigarette taxes, that's bad public policy.

    So how should the Southern Nevada health district fairly uphold a voter-approved statute? It's simple. Focus on the voters' intent and concentrate their enforcement efforts on places where "the children" could be exposed to secondhand smoke. Investigate citizen complaints and cite businesses only if aggrieved parties can be identified and demonstrate harm.

    Citing individual smokers is a terrible idea that will further clog overburdened courts, cost government more than it can recover in fines and provoke citizen backlash. The Southern Nevada Health District should put a match to this policy -- somewhere smoke is allowed, of course.



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    Terry wrote on September 01, 2007 05:57 PM: They need to get on with there life. If the business wants to have it a smoking business then let them. It's his business and if people that don't like a business that has smoking then go to a non smoking place. The goverment should not get into this. They did not pay for his business. The next thing that will happen is the goverment will start on fat people and the resturants that serve them food!!!! and on and on and on.


    edg wrote on August 18, 2007 07:23 AM: I was coming to vegas when the casinos had cigarettes on the tables/hasnt killed me yet i agree with dugh/smoking is legal unlike crack and heroin/anti smoking is not about health its about money just like redlight cameras and seat belt belt laws/the nanny govt thinks people are too stupid to make their own choices/if a smoker dies its because of cigarettes/if a non smoker dies its because of 2nd hand smoke get real next lets ban perfume /ever been near a woman or man with too much/makes your eyes water just like smoke


    maxine wrote on August 17, 2007 12:03 PM: "The Southern Nevada Health District is preparing to turn office staff into the Puff Patrol,"
    —————————
    It's fairly evident that these people need to get a life, or do some sort of meaningful volunteer work.


    gravarg wrote on August 17, 2007 08:05 AM: Its simple. Its a law. I know the police are understaffed but its not the Health Dept's job to use force on uncooperative people who are breaking the law. Hmm, here's an idea. If the lawbreaker won't cooperate give the Health Inspecter the power to close the business on the spot for 24 hours. The business owners will soon stop the smoking or go out of business.


    Dugh wrote on August 16, 2007 08:25 PM: You have to love this one. "Smoking Kills". Run the F away. So does breathing, so does driving, so does getting in the shower, so does living.
    Its amazing to me that someone doesnt know that once they are born, they start a huge path on the road to being really dead.
    It makes me wonder, If you get hit by a bus tomorrow, will you still like the taste of tofu, still wonder what its like, not to remember dancing on the bar after drinking some Jack. Still screaming at your TV when your favorite NASCAR driver crashes into a wall.
    NO. I think you will lose more sleep tonight concerned that you will not live to 100.
    Smoking Kills. So does just about everything else in your everyday life.


    G. Humphrey wrote on August 16, 2007 07:07 PM: We are a far cry from the way people make a living or devour there free time to try and compare us to Ca. or NYC. is a joke. This city was built on gaming, smoking, drinking etc. and based on a age limit of 21 so children wouldn't be allowed (& shouldn't be) or exposed to adult activity. The business's (bar's, casino's, restaurant's)have gone out of there way over the years to accommadate those who choose not be around smoker's! For those who choose to vote for this law did you ever take into consideration the jobs that would be lost. The small business's & family owned operations that will end up closeing there doors. That the casino's are the only one's making out again as usual because they were exempt from the law. And when you go and eat in a restaurant in a casino being a non-smoker or child that your not exposing yourself to second hand smoke? What that invisable wall that keeps the smoke out from the casino adjoining the restaurant is not exposing you to it? Think again! All this law is doing is putting the little guy out of business & people out of jobs.
    And yes the way they pushed that law on the ballot & threw advertisement was to make it look like it was to protect our children. Not to mention people weren't aware that the way it was put on the ballot (in two seperate questions)that one was going to pass no matter what. If you don't like smoker's then go to where they cater to you. Quit trying to take away our rights! Where down to very few left as it is.


    F. Eichorn wrote on August 16, 2007 05:24 PM: I read this editorial twice and still don't get it. What are you advocating here? There is a Law, The Clean Indoor Air Act. Are you saying, break the law?. The majority of Nevadans spoke. The overwhelming majority, 78 % don't smoke. We know that secondhand smoke is harmfull to our health. Why should we(the majority) have to hide from smokers? Isn't this a democracy? For you to assume that we didn't know what we voted for is absurd. I knew exactly what i voted for, and with criminal actions(which of course was taken away by a judge). Smoking kills, Fact!
    And by the way, i lived in NYC in 2003 when the smoking ban was put in effect by Mayor Bloomberg. and to site one incident for 13 million people 2 weeks after the ban, misrepresents what indeed was going on. Believe me, after 2 months just about everyone was obeying the law. Of course laws are supposed to be obeyed. The people in the Health Dept are doing a fantastic job. Let's applaud them. Let's follow the law. It has been 9 months. It's time!

    F. Eichorn


    Mary wrote on August 16, 2007 03:54 PM: I'm not the least bit interested in the children. I voted for the law against smoking for me. No-smoking bans work in Los Angeles and New York, the two largest cities in the country. Heck, the ban even works in Reno! There is no reason why it can't work here. The majority of the people of the State of Nevada voted to pass the no-smoking ordinance. Quit complaining and learn to live with it.


    Marc D wrote on August 16, 2007 10:28 AM: can't you see where this is going?
    there will be health cops, the health dept will get its own police force just like the school district did,all this law is going to do is cost us more money in the end just like every other law that gets passed.

    how does the old saying go? pass a new law and give another bureaucrat a job.

    and if you want to live in some enlighten state then go back to california, we all chose not to live there and yet the ppl that move out of there keep trying to force the laws of that state on us.

    the idea that kids in bars are harmed by the smoke and thats the bar's fault is laughable,its the parents responsiblity to keep the kids out of the place not the govt.

    I remember when the seat belt law was passed, the govt said that no one would get pulled over for not wearing the belt, that it was a secondary offense.
    well during the last legislature session they tried to make it a primary offense so we could now be pulled over for it.

    these "activists" will not stop until they jam this crap down all of our throats,screw personal responsiblity let the state take over and throw our rights out the window


    Ken wrote on August 16, 2007 09:53 AM: You are correct jon. One wonders, how many times do you have to explain this simple idea. If A bar chooses to allow smoking and you dont like smoke - dont go in. I have left two of my favorite bars because they dont allow smoking. I choose not to go there. When these choices are not available to Americans, what do we have that separates us from a third world contry?
    Pass a law making me wear a helmet.
    Pass a law making me wear a seatbelt.
    Pass a law making my life smoke free.
    Pass a law making me lock my guns up.
    Im still gonna die and so are you.
    Lifes journey is not to show up at the grave in a well preserved body, but rather to show up exausted, with chocolate in one hand, wine in the other, screaming "Holy S&%t, what a ride.


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