Smoking ban expansion passes overwhelmingly
After all the talk last week about possible amendments to the proposed smoking ban and lack of consensus and alleged uncertainty, Council today overwhelmingly expanded the smoking ban, approving the ordinance 13-2 while shooting down various amendments. Alexis Grant reports for the Chronicle:
The City Council voted today to extend Houston's indoor smoking ban to bars but to continue allowing smoking in outdoor patios and in bars that promote cigar smoking and derive significant revenue from tobacco sales.
The 13-2 vote was a victory for Mayor Bill White, who wanted to extend the ban while leaving some locations available for public smoking. The only dissenters were council members Addie Wiseman and Michael Berry, who had said previously that they opposed any extension of the ban and that the decision on whether to allow smoking should be up to individual businesses.
The council rejected several amendments that would have weakened the ordinance or extended its reach. The only amendment approved expands the ban to include meetings of nonprofit organizations at their own facilities.
Apparently, the influence of lobbyists on this issue (which concerned the Editorial LiveJournalists) was way overestimated, as Mayor White and Councilmember Alvarado easily won approval of the ban they wanted, and Councilmembers Berry and Wiseman stood in opposition to the ordinance, just as they promised they would all along. The best guess here is that some of these amendments were just window dressing to allow certain councilmembers to tell constituents they tried to improve the ordinance, but their colleagues wouldn't go along, and they had to do something.
The ordinance will not take effect until September 2007.
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 10/18/06 01:19 PM | Print |
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