DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Tailgate Forum Smoking ban extends to apartments in California city

BELMONT, California: During her 50 years of smoking, Edith Frederickson says she has lit up in restaurants and bars, airplanes and trains, and indoors and out, all as part of a two-pack-a-day habit that she regrets not a bit. But as of two weeks ago, Frederickson can no longer smoke in the one place she loves the most: her home.

Frederickson lives in an apartment in Belmont, California, a quiet city about 23 miles, or 37 kilometers, south of San Francisco that is now home to perhaps the nation's strictest anti-smoking law, effectively outlawing lighting up in all apartment buildings.

"I'm absolutely outraged," said Frederickson, 72, pulling on a Winston as she sat on a concrete slab outside her single-room apartment. "They're telling you how to live and what to do, and they're doing it right here in America."

And that the ban should have originated in her very building - a sleepy government-subsidized retirement complex called Bonnie Brae Terrace - is even more galling. Indeed, according to city officials, a driving force behind the passage of the law was a group of retirees from the complex who lobbied the city to stop secondhand smoke from drifting into their apartments from the neighbors' places.

"They took it upon themselves to do something about it," said Valerie Harnish, the city's information services manager. "And they did."

Public health advocates are closely watching to see what happens with Belmont, seeing it as a new front in their national battle against tobacco, one that seeks to place limits on smoking in buildings where tenants share walls, ceilings and - by their logic - air.

Not surprisingly, habitually health-conscious California has been ahead of the curve on the issue, with several other cities passing bans on smoking in most units in privately owned apartment buildings, but none has gone as far as Belmont, which prohibits smoking in any apartment that shares a floor or ceiling with another, including condominiums.

"I think Belmont broke through this invisible barrier in the sense that it addressed drifting smoke in housing as a public health issue," said Serena Chen, the regional director of policy and tobacco programs for the American Lung Association of California.

At a local level, the debate over the law has divided the residents of the Bonnie Brae into two camps, with the likes of Frederickson, a hardy German émigré, on one side, and Ray Goodrich, a slim 84-year-old with a pulmonary disease and a lifelong allergy problem, on the other.

And, as with many combatants, there is a mix of respect and animosity.

"She is one tough old woman," Goodrich said.

Frederickson is less loving.

"I would not acknowledge that man for anything in the world," she said. "He started this as a vendetta against other residents."

A soft-spoken North Carolinian who grew up playing in tobacco warehouses as a child, Goodrich hardly seems the vendetta type, but he did say he noticed smoke from neighbors' rooms soon after he moved into Bonnie Brae in 1998.

"It gave me an instant headache, kind of like an iron band around the head," Goodrich said. "I could be sitting and have the air filters going, which eliminated the visible smoke, but the smoke was still there."

He finally decided he had had enough after a fire broke out in a smoker's room in the complex in 2003, a blaze that was fed by the tenant's oxygen tank.

"I came around the corner, and there was just a giant puff of black smoke, and I knew I wasn't going to last five seconds in that," Goodrich said. "It was like Dante's inferno up there."

Goodrich began a letter-writing campaign, petitioning everyone from local officials to the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development, which helps finance the privately managed Bonnie Brae.

"We need your help," read one of Goodrich's letters in July 2006. "A barking dog disturbs our sleep but will not kill us. Secondhand smoke is killing us."

That letter caught the attention of several members of the Belmont City Council, including Dave Warden, a Belmont native and software consultant who served on the council until 2007. Warden said council members were particularly moved when Goodrich followed up with visits to Council meetings, often joined by other Bonnie Brae tenants - using walkers, wheelchairs and oxygen tanks - and telling harrowing tales of life surrounded by secondhand smoke.

"I think that they didn't have a grand strategy, I think they just wanted some change, and they didn't know how to get it," he said. "And once it got discussed seriously, they got very encouraged."

But as word spread, council members started to receive complaints implying Belmont had become a "nanny state." Goodrich was also feeling the hate, he said, getting "cold stares and dead silence" from smokers at the complex.

"The worst place you can be is between an addict and their fix," he said. It did not help, he said, that most of the smokers were younger - "they don't live as long," he said - and more vocal.

But finally, after more than a year of deliberation, the Council passed the law in October 2007, barring smoking anywhere in the city of about 25,000 except in detached homes and yards, streets and some sidewalks, and designated smoking areas outside.

The law took effect on Jan. 9, after a 14-month grace period that allowed apartment buildings time to comply with the new rules - like rewriting lease agreements to ban smoking - and tenants who objected to the changes to move. The law brings with it the threat of $100 fines, though city officials say no penalties have been levied yet.

Goodrich says his days in politics are over. "I'm working on my second retirement," he said. "The smoking stuff was my last hurrah."

He says he suspects that some residents still smoke secretly late at night, while others crowd the small outdoor areas where smoking is still allowed.

Frederickson is one of those, at least for the time being; after all, she says, she is looking to move out of Belmont if she can find something cheap enough.

Until then, she seems defiant, despite feeling like a criminal in Belmont.

"And I'm going to keep being a criminal, let me tell you that," she said.

http://www.iht.com/articles/2009/01/27/america/smoking.1-416522.php?page=1

And folks said it would never get to a point where the government told you what you could do in your own home.......

Just wait its going to get worse

See, the problem with your theory is that you assumed I was speaking about the tenant. The owner of the building is not given the CHOICE to choose smoking or non-smoking. It is their building.

There are certain things I do not believe the government has the ability to tell me. One of which is what the hell I do in my own home. Sure, they subsidize this building. Guess what, if you have a mortgage, then the government most likely owns your home (through Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac). By your reasoning, it's a federal building and I am not allowed to smoke (or won't be soon as noone raises any cane over this). This is cool with you? I cannot see how anyone would think the government in charge of your household is good.

What's next? They are gonna tell you you can't have booze in a fed housing? What about fatty foods? How about a gun? You can't carry a weapon on fed property either. Wait till they decide what is best for you to do in your house......

The thing about personal rights though, is that they usual stop when they start infringing upon other people's personal rights. In this case, you are talking about smoke blowing into other people's apartments, and units burning down because neighbors in other units smoke.

I don't necessarily agree with the law, but I can see the purpose behind it.

I can see the purpose. But it should be the owner's choice. Let the government choose this now and they will tell you what you're gonna let them choose later.

I'm kinda torn here. first, I think smokers have rights.. I know when I smoked I hated people telling me where or when I could smoke.

But I also understood that smoking was a personal choice of mine and that if it only affected me, that would be one thing. But I knew that it had been proven to affect others around me. So I tried my best to keep smoke away from other folks as best as I could.

I would resent the Government telling me I can't smoke in my own home. That would bug me. and they'd not get me to stop either. (that's if I were still a smoker)

But there are a few things here that aren't the same thing as my situation. For instance, She doesn't own her apartment and her apartment is federally subsidized as well.,

If I owned an apartment building and the rent was subsidized or not, and then I decided that I wanted an all Non smoking building, I'd add it to the lease. And when it's time to renew, they'd either have to agree or vacate.

If I own the building, then it's my choice. I would have rights also.

Now, in this case, they are, IMO, handling it incorrectly. This lady has a lease... I don't know when it's due to be renewed, but in order to be fair, the right thing would be to inform all residents that smoking will be banned in the buildings and apartments. And that in the new lease you will need to sign when your old lease is up, this will be a condition included.

That way, people would have a choice to either quit smoking or find a new place to live.

To me, its only unfair because they are saying to her,, OK,,, yesterday you were allowed to smoke here and today you are not.... stop or your gone.

Hell, even the state of Ohio gave people plenty of time to adjust to the smoking ban in public places... we knew 3 or 4 months in advance that as of January 1, 2007. you could no longer smoke in bars and resturants.

As for legislating what you can and what you can't do in your own home,,, it will only happen if we let it. But this smoking thing.. man that is a hot button item,

It's clearly not good for the smoker and it has been clearly proven to have adverse affects on those around them.

It's like a loaded weapon... you wouldn't let a person wave a loaded gun around in public because it could go off and kill someone.. Well, while a cigerette won't have that same immediate impact, it's still a long term danger to innocent bystanders...

Where do we draw the line man....

The Bogus 'Science' of Secondhand Smoke

Gio Batta Gori
Special to washingtonpost.com
Tuesday, January 30, 2007; 12:00 AM

Smoking cigarettes is a clear health risk, as most everyone knows. But lately, people have begun to worry about the health risks of secondhand smoke. Some policymakers and activists are even claiming that the government should crack down on secondhand smoke exposure, given what "the science" indicates about such exposure.

Last July, introducing his office's latest report on secondhand smoke, then-U.S. Surgeon General Richard Carmona asserted that "there is no risk-free level of secondhand smoke exposure," that "breathing secondhand smoke for even a short time can damage cells and set the cancer process in motion," and that children exposed to secondhand smoke will "eventually . . . develop cardiovascular disease and cancers over time."

Such claims are certainly alarming. But do the studies Carmona references support his claims, and are their findings as sound as he suggests?

Lung cancer and cardiovascular diseases develop at advancing ages. Estimating the risk of those diseases posed by secondhand smoke requires knowing the sum of momentary secondhand smoke doses that nonsmokers have internalized over their lifetimes. Such lifetime summations of instant doses are obviously impossible, because concentrations of secondhand smoke in the air, individual rates of inhalation, and metabolic transformations vary from moment to moment, year after year, location to location.

In an effort to circumvent this capital obstacle, all secondhand smoke studies have estimated risk using a misleading marker of "lifetime exposure." Yet, instant exposures also vary uncontrollably over time, so lifetime summations of exposure could not be, and were not, measured.

Typically, the studies asked 60--70 year-old self-declared nonsmokers to recall how many cigarettes, cigars or pipes might have been smoked in their presence during their lifetimes, how thick the smoke might have been in the rooms, whether the windows were open, and similar vagaries. Obtained mostly during brief phone interviews, answers were then recorded as precise measures of lifetime individual exposures.

In reality, it is impossible to summarize accurately from momentary and vague recalls, and with an absurd expectation of precision, the total exposure to secondhand smoke over more than a half-century of a person's lifetime. No measure of cumulative lifetime secondhand smoke exposure was ever possible, so the epidemiologic studies estimated risk based not only on an improper marker of exposure, but also on exposure data that are illusory.

Adding confusion, people with lung cancer or cardiovascular disease are prone to amplify their recall of secondhand smoke exposure. Others will fib about being nonsmokers and will contaminate the results. More than two dozen causes of lung cancer are reported in the professional literature, and over 200 for cardiovascular diseases; their likely intrusions have never been credibly measured and controlled in secondhand smoke studies. Thus, the claimed risks are doubly deceptive because of interferences that could not be calculated and corrected.

In addition, results are not consistently reproducible. The majority of studies do not report a statistically significant change in risk from secondhand smoke exposure, some studies show an increase in risk, and ¿ astoundingly ¿ some show a reduction of risk.

Some prominent anti-smokers have been quietly forthcoming on what "the science" does and does not show. Asked to quantify secondhand smoke risks at a 2006 hearing at the UK House of Lords, Oxford epidemiologist Sir Richard Peto ¿ a leader of the secondhand smoke crusade ¿ replied, "I am sorry not to be more helpful; you want numbers and I could give you numbers..., but what does one make of them? ...These hazards cannot be directly measured."

It has been fashionable to ignore the weakness of "the science" on secondhand smoke, perhaps in the belief that claiming "the science is settled" will lead to policies and public attitudes that will reduce the prevalence of smoking. But such a Faustian bargain is an ominous precedent in public health and political ethics. Consider how minimally such policies as smoking bans in bars and restaurants really reduce the prevalence of smoking, and yet how odious and socially unfair such prohibitions are.

By any sensible account, the anachronism of tobacco use should eventually vanish in an advancing civilization. Why must we promote this process under the tyranny of deception?

Presumably, we are grown-up people, with a civilized sense of fair play, and dedicated to disciplined and rational discourse. We are fortunate enough to live in a free country that is respectful of individual choices and rights, including the right to honest public policies. Still, while much is voiced about the merits of forceful advocacy, not enough is said about the fundamental requisite of advancing public health with sustainable evidence, rather than by dangerous, wanton conjectures.

A frank discussion is needed to restore straight thinking in the legitimate uses of "the science" of epidemiology -- uses that go well beyond secondhand smoke issues. Today, health rights command high priority on many agendas, as they should. It is not admissible to presume that people expect those rights to be served less than truthfully.


Gio Batta Gori, an epidemiologist and toxicologist, is a fellow of the Health Policy Center in Bethesda. He is a former deputy director of the National Cancer Institute's Division of Cancer Cause and Prevention, and he received the U.S. Public Health Service Superior Service Award in 1976 for his efforts to define less hazardous cigarettes. Gori's article "The Surgeon General's Doctored Opinion" will appear in the spring issue of the Cato Institute's Regulation Magazine.




http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/29/AR2007012901158.html

I didn't take the time to read all of this,,, but the title kinda indicates that second hand smoke concerns are bogas.

I won't do it cause I know better and I don't have the time, But I bet you I can find a thousand studies that say the opposite...

Like I said, I didn't read the article,,, so maybe I have it all wrong Jules...

"It's not your own home. It's a space you rent from someone."

Really?
What about the owners of condos.The city is telling them what they can't do in a home they purchased.
It's the People's Republic of California.I'm surprised it took the Central Commitee this long to intrude inside people's home.

It's a little silly to comment on what you won't take the time to read. Step outside the little box and read things outside what the mainstream media and healthcare "experts" want you to believe once in a while Daman....you might be surprised what you learn. You might be interested in how they conduct these little studies you so wholeheartedly believe in.

It says any dwelling that shares a floor/ceiling or wall with your neighbors. This can (and I'm willing to bet will) be later used to eliminate it from duplexes as well where they share a wall.

Condo's (that they own), apartments they rent, soon to be duplexes they own. Pretty soon you get to any home that is mortgage backed by the government (hint that's all of them).

You'll see soon enough that when you let the government into your house they start regulating it. Remember, in California, they already have restrictors in place to regulate how much Air Conditioning you have (under the auspice of energy conservation).

I sure don't like the sounds of this crap!!!

MOre of a time things Jules,, I'll get to it

Jules, OK,, now I've read it.. I still choose to believe that second hand smoke is dangerous.

Take all the science you want out of it. think of it this way, if smoking is dangerous to the smoker then it stands to reason that it's dangerous to the person sitting next to him. At question here is the degree of danger.

I don't know what is true regarding the degree... so many conflicting reports and so many well educated people standing on both sides of that fence.

Bottom line is this, it may not be as bad as some say, but you will never convince me that second hand smoke doesn't damage non smokers that are exposed to it.

I would put money on you being at FAR greater risk from simply breathing intra-city air, or the air walking down the sidewalk that is rife with fumes from tailpipes.

In fact, I would put the level of risk as being so low as to not even register on any relevency scale outside of the narrow focus of those tests & studies funded by the anit-smoking groups.



The human lungs will, within 5 years, return to a normal healthy pink after decades of abuse by a pack-a-day smoker.

I find it hard to believe, in any way, that the non-smoker who only ever has occassional incidental contact with smoke MAYBE once per day... smoke that is diluted and dispersed to a very large degree long before it ever reaches their nostrils... is ever going to have ANY REAL consequnces as a result of it.

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What am I getting at? Smokers get first hand AND second hand smoke. Non smokers get only second hand smoke.

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Not exactly sure what your driving at Arch.... Yeah, if your a smoker it would seem to stand to reason that you would receive more smoke than non smokers....

I think you confused me..........

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I would put money on you being at FAR greater risk from simply breathing intra-city air, or the air walking down the sidewalk that is rife with fumes from tailpipes.

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And I won't argue with that because I have no specific knowledge to tell me differently.. you may be 100% correct.. dunno.

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In fact, I would put the level of risk as being so low as to not even register on any relevency scale outside of the narrow focus of those tests & studies funded by the anit-smoking groups.

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Once again, I've never said anything even remotely, to disagree with that.

What I've said is that I BELIEVE that second hand smoke is harmful to folks..but that I didn't know the DEGREE of harm caused.

There are tons of studies out there by medical experts that say second hand smoke can kill ya. Probably just as many that say it won't.

When it comes right down to it, I think it's safe to say that the one thing most of us can agree on is that it is harmful to the smoker him/herself! if we can agree that smokers are harmed by smoking, then it stands to reason that non smokers are harmed by second hand smoke.

Again, let me say this clearly,,, TO WHAT DEGREE, I don't know.

Funny thing, I always said that if I ever quit smoking, I promised myself I woudn't be one of "THOSE" ex smokers that badgered the hell out of current smokers.. and for the most part I don't.

Up until 4 weeks ago, my wife smoked a pack a day.. it bugged me.. not at first.. but later. The smell got to me.. Wasn't the second hand smoke thing, it was just the smell... if I sit in a bar and someone goes outside for a smoke then walks back in, it just gags me. I don't complain.. I understand the addicition.. been there, done that. 4 packs a day for a long time until November 7th, 2006 at 1:25pm.. it was a tuesday.... I had my last cig. That's when it ended for me.

So please folks, don't try to convince me second hand smoke doesn't have an effect on non smokers... It does,,, I'm convinced of it.. But I'll never argue with anyone on the amount of effect it has,,, cause basically, I don't really think anyone knows.

Dude, I'm still amazed at that: 4 packs a day. That's 80 cigs.

Let's assume you slept 8 hours a day. That gives you 16 hours to smoke. That comes out to 5 cigs per waking hour. Or, 1 every 12 minutes!!! And you just quit? Kudo's to you!!!!!!

Better outlaw Granny's candles now. The smoke coming from they may be killing people off by the thousands

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Dude, I'm still amazed at that: 4 packs a day. That's 80 cigs.

Let's assume you slept 8 hours a day. That gives you 16 hours to smoke. That comes out to 5 cigs per waking hour. Or, 1 every 12 minutes!!! And you just quit? Kudo's to you!!!!!!

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It's very true Arch... I'd sit at work here at home.. nobody around, smoke, drink coffee or pepsi, talk on the phone and email customers all day long.. Being a basic workaholic, I'd start at about 6am and work until 8 or 9 with breaks to take the dog for a walk or eat a meal...

Even walking the dog, I'd take the cigs with me and smoke a few..

THe coughing got so bad that it actually would hurt physically at times.

Sometime just before I stopped,, maybe a month or so, I found out I needed major surgery.. I got to thinking.. if it hurts that much without being cut open, what the hell was it going to feel like afterward..

I made up my mind, went for hyponsis to Don Mannerino in Beachwood... 125 bucks later, I never even wanted a cig again.... not even with my wife sitting next to me puffing away.

It's amazing and scary all at once.....

j/c

Thought this might make a good Friday thread. But here's the thing.........

Why not "grandfather" the law in? I mean if you already live there and smoke, how fair is it to "impose" upon somebody that they either change their lifestyle or move?

By grandfathering the law in, once you already live somewhere, you can keep smoking. But upon moving, you would have a choice to remain in that town, or move elsewhere.

And how exactly do they plan to impose this law? Aren't communities across our nation already money strapped to the point that such frivilous laws only add a further burden on such places?

If somebody says, "Yes, I have an apartment for rent but it's a non-smoking building.", I'm given a choice. But once you're living there and this comes after the fact?

Houston, we have a problem...........

Oh well, our country was founded on civil disobedience. God knows I do my part in that Patriotic tradition.......

I quit smoking twenty some years ago .. Hate the smell . Refuse to be around it ! But by God I dam sure would defend your right to smoke in your own Home , Condo , Apt or what ever , Porch , backyard .. USSA , Darn Nanny State

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Why not "grandfather" the law in? I mean if you already live there and smoke, how fair is it to "impose" upon somebody that they either change their lifestyle or move?

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Well that's kinda what I was eluding to with the lease thing.. maybe they can do extention for a long time resident or something... give her an opportunity to find other suitable housing.

Then again, for all we know, this little old lady isn't some nice little pie baking granny... perhaps she is the town Biatch and they are looking for a way to kick her to the curb

Grandfathering it is just a means to temporarily placate those that would otherwise object.

The fact that it is becoming law at all is the problem, not how it will be implemented.

This country has gone mad...all these whiners...we have become a nation of wimps. Sniveling, limp wristed, limp minded wimps.

If you don't like my comments.... guess what??? (the only 1 finger salute I could find in the available icon list)

I think the thing here is that this is not a HOME. It's an apartment building and it's federally subsidized to boot.

This was tried in I think Cuyahoga falls or something. They were condos, side by side units.. the old guy lived next door to a younger woman,, she smoked and he sued to have her stopped... both owned thier respective units and the court upheld that she didn't have to stop...it's her home...

If I live in a free standing home that I own and my next door neighbor objects to me smoking on my property, he can go pound salt and I'll fight him to the surpreme court if needed..

But this is different, this is federally funded housing. It's an apartment building..

It's owned by someone,, so even if they city didn't make the rule, the owner can certainly demand no smoking if that's what they put in the lease.. just like no pets allowed.

If they didn't have it set up as a non smoking building that's different. it has to be handled differently.

By the way, I* don't like the city ruling on this stuff either, but there is more to this...

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Don't think. You will come out ahead.

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Welll peen, your an ex judge and a lawyer,,, are you saying to me that there is not difference between a home you own and an apartment you rent?

The problem I see is that the city made this a law.

But a landlord can make changes with enough notice to any part of a lease. I know mine does.. My first lease said they would pay for water usage up to so much. Now the new lease that I'll have to sign in October if I stay here says I'll have to pay for water consumption.


I also don't see how the city could ever enforce a law like this in a private dwelling such as a home or even an attached condo.

so your smartbutt remark means what again?

Damanshot said:

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I think the thing here is that this is not a HOME. It's an apartment building and it's federally subsidized to boot.

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The article said:

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Public health advocates are closely watching to see what happens with Belmont, seeing it as a new front in their national battle against tobacco, one that seeks to place limits on smoking in buildings where tenants share walls, ceilings and - by their logic - air.

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See, This is where it's not JUST apartments. This is where they will move to Condo's, duplexes or whatever. You can own the Condo. But if it shares walls, then you cannot smoke. You can own half the duplex, but because it shares walls, you can't smoke.

It's not hard to see where this will go. Wait till they get this far and it will be too late to gain footing to retract them all. They will come after your house next (or mine) because it is federally backed and therefore they will say it's technically federal property. And then soon enough, they will say all property is technically US property and no smoking. Think it's far fetched don't ya? Not that far fetched bud.

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Public health advocates are closely watching to see what happens with Belmont, seeing it as a new front in their national battle against tobacco, one that seeks to place limits on smoking in buildings where tenants share walls, ceilings and - by their logic - air.

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Keyz, it says TENENTS... doesn't say OWNERS........

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It means you don't care about the constitution of the former United States.

Don't waste my time.

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well if you feel that I don't care about the consititution of the former united states, then why the hell did you bother responding to me.....That was a bit of a waste of your time wasn't it. specially since you have no idea what I believe in. You are just assuming..

Innocent until proven guilty,,,isn't that how it's supposed to be Peen..,. you are the lawyer,, you tell me.