City snuffs public smoking
Ordinance targets bars, restaurants.

Smokers in Columbia have until early January to puff in public.

Early today, the Columbia City Council - in a 4-3 decision that centered on the rights of smokers versus the rights of consumers not to breathe secondhand smoke - voted to ban smoking in most public places in the city.

The ban would apply to bars and restaurants as well as other areas served by the public, such as nursing homes, open-air or enclosed sports stadiums and bingo halls.

The measure is an amended version of an existing city law that bans smoking in city-owned buildings and other areas.

Proponents said the ordinance would protect employees in smoky workplaces from harmful secondhand smoke.

The ban takes effect Jan. 9.

Opponents - including three members of the city council - said the measure amounts to an unfair intrusion of local government into private business.

Council members voted to pass the ban at 12:47 a.m. after a public hearing that lasted nearly five hours. The ban includes an exemption for patios, as long as more than half of the patio is designated smoke free.

"The impacts on health are significant," Mayor Darwin Hindman said of secondhand smoke. "It affects a tremendous number of people in a tremendous number of ways. As far as I can see, the only way to eliminate that health concern is to eliminate that secondhand smoke."

Space was at a premium inside the Daniel Boone Building last night. All of the more than 200 seats inside council chambers on the fourth floor were filled, and three televisions in a conference room downstairs were tuned to the debate for the overflow crowd.

While supporters of the ban easily outnumbered opponents at the hearing, business owners and a Libertarian group spoke passionately about what they said they believe is an attempt by the city to trample their rights. Smoking is a choice, many said, and so is whether to patronize a business that allows it.

Glenn Nielsen, a member of the opposition group Boone Liberty Coalition, stood outside city hall before the hearing, handing out "Stop the Ban" stickers to like-minded attendees.

"We support smoke-free restaurants and bars, just not using the force of government to require bars and restaurants to do so," he said.

Several others who spoke against the ordinance, particularly Columbia business owners, echoed those comments. They feared an across-the-board ban on smoking would hurt the bottom lines of restaurants and bars.

Doug Brady, manager at McGinty’s Pub on Old 63, said people who want smoke-free bars should move to France. That country announced earlier this week it will ban smoking in public places beginning next year.

"This is America," Brady said. "This is the most ludicrous, anti-American thing I’ve ever seen."

When the public hearing portion of yesterday’s special meeting closed shortly after 11 p.m., council members openly struggled with how to balance the rights of business owners with what most on the panel agreed was a legitimate health concern.

As a compromise to business owners, Second Ward Councilman Chris Janku introduced the motion to allow smoking on patios.

"I was trying to accommodate different interests," he said.

Fourth Ward Councilman Jim Loveless joined with Laura Nauser of the Fifth Ward and Almeta Crayton of the First Ward to vote against the ban.

Hindman, Janku, Third Ward Councilman Bob Hutton and Barbara Hoppe of the Sixth Ward voted for it.

"This ordinance, in my mind, is a significant intrusion on private businesses," Loveless said. "If a government is going to do that, then there should be an overwhelming public benefit."

Said Hutton: "The most important thing about this is the impact on employees."

---

Reach Matthew LeBlanc at (573) 815-1720 or mleblanc@tribmail.com.

---