Late last year, the Massachusetts House of Representatives voted 125-10 in favor of smokefree workplace legislation for all MA workers (including bar and restaurant workers). The Massachusetts Senate voted 29-10 in favor of similar legislation. Each proposal required implementation by July 5, 2004.

The two bills moved to a House/Senate conference committee to resolve minor differences. After a long delay, all issues have now been resolved. The slightly revised legislation goes back to the House and Senate where it is expected to pass this week. Then it goes to the Governor for his signature or veto. Governor Romney has said he will sign the bill into law noting that "people have a right to breathe clean air and be free of secondhand smoke."

One hundred Massachusetts localities, including Boston, have already enacted and implemented smokefree workplace legislation. The law will provide similar protection for the rest of MA residents.

Massachusetts will be the sixth state to adopt smokefree workplace legislation for ALL workers (including office, restaurant, bar, bingo, bowling, nightclub, and casino workers), joining California, Delaware, New York, Connecticut, and Maine.

Rhode Island is expect to become the seventh smokefree workplace state shortly.

Florida, Vermont, Utah, and Idaho have passed smokefree workplace laws for restaurant workers but not bar workers.

 

On Thursday, the Rhode Island House of Representatives voted 61-0 in favor of legislation that would clear the air in virtually every public place and workplace, including bars, restaurants, malls, health-care facilities, schools, and public transportation waiting areas. The Rhode Island Senate must still approve the measure, which is in its Committee on Health and Human Services.

If passed, the law would mostly take effect March 1, 2005. Bars and nonprofit organizations, such as Knights of Columbus or Veterans of Foreign Wars, would have an extra year to comply.

Rhode Island Governor Don Carcieri said he favored smokefree workplace legislation and is expected to sign such a bill when it reaches his desk.

Six states-- California, Delaware, New York, Connecticut, Maine, and Massachusetts-- have passed smokefree workplace legislation for all workers (including office, restaurant, bar, bingo, bowling, nightclub, and casino workers).

Influential legislators say this will be the year Rhode Island passes smokefree workplace legislation. Last year, the Rhode Island Senate passed such legislation, but the House held back. This year, the House appears likely to join the Senate and perhaps even take the lead.

"I am confident we will see some kind of smokefree workplace law passed in Rhode Island," House Speaker Bill Murphy said at the start of this year's legislative session.

"I would like to see an end" to workplace smoking, House Majority Leader Gordon Fox said Wednesday. Legislation is being drafted do just that, Fox said, including one to be introduced by the House leadership, a sure sign that it has a serious chance of passing.

Rep. Arthur Corvese of North Providence, chairman of the House Labor Committee that will hear smokefree bills, said: "I feel something positive will come out of it. Some kind of smokefree workplace law will come out of the House this year."

"ALL workers (including office, restaurant, bar, bingo, bowling, casino, tavern, pub, and nightclub workers) deserve a safe, healthy, smokefree work environment," says Joe Cherner, founder of BREATHE-- Bar and Restaurant Employees Advocating Together for a Healthy Environment. "Laws should treat the health of all workers EQUALLY. Bar and restaurant workers should have the same right to a smokefree work envrionment as everyone else. No worker should have to breathe tobacco smoke pollution to hold a job, because it causes cancer, heart disease, and respiratory disease."

Rep. Elizabeth Dennigan of Pawtucket and East Providence has introduced a bill, as she has for each of the past several years. This year, however, she feels more confident that her bill, or some bill, will pass, thus providing all Rhode Island workers with a safe, healthy, smokefree workplace.

"Massachusetts is poised to enact legislation," Dennigan said, "both chambers have passed it and Governor Romney says he will sign it. Connecticut, Delaware, and Maine have already passed it. The entire state of New York has passed it; prior to that it was just New York City.

"We have received data on a weekly basis from New York that has shown that jobs in the restaurant and bar industry have increased," Dennigan said.

But she said advocates wouldn't be concentrating on the economic arguments as they have done in past years. This year they will focus on the health effects of second-hand smoke.

"In past years, I thought most people realized the health impacts, so I focused on the economics," Dennigan said. But many people don't realize that data "clearly show a strong causal relationship between secondhand smoke and heart disease, cancer, respiratory diseases and developmental problems in children."

"We are trying to get the health message across that even if smoke does not bother you, rest assured that it is harming you and harming your family," she said.

 

Georgia state senator Don Thomas will introduce legislation within the next two weeks that would provide all Georgia workers with a smokefree workplace, including bar and restaurant workers.

If successful, Georgia would join California, Delaware, New York, Connecticut, Maine, and Massachussets as a smokefree workplace state. Hundreds of cities have also passed smokefree workplace legislation.

"This is not an effort to make people quit smoking," Thomas, a family doctor, told the Marietta Daily Journal. "It's to make it so their smoke doesn't hurt others."

Andy Lord, director of Georgia Tobacco Initiatives for the American Cancer Society, said that several Georgia jurisdictions have already passed smokefree workplace laws, including Valdosta, Bainbridge, Statesboro, Gwinnett County and DeKalb County.

We have tremendous momentum, and we want there to be a statewide law so we dont have to continue fighting these little battles, Lord said.

 

Annapolis, 12/16/03... At a news conference in Annapolis (MD) today, two legislators joined with health groups and bar and restaurant workers to announce their intention to introduce smokefree workplace legislation.

"It needs to happen now. It needs to happen today," said Delegate Barbara Frush, who will be introducing legislation in Maryland's House of Delegates.

"People are speaking out and saying, 'We want a clean work environment,'" added Senator Ida Ruben, who will be introducing legislation in Maryland's State Senate.

"I work in a bar and restaurant," said Jen Valente, head of Maryland BREATHE (Bar and Restaurant Employees Advocating Together for a Healthy Environment). "Our right to breathe clean air is just as important as others. Bar and restaurant employees are NOT second rate citizens and should not be treated as such." She urged legislators to "protect all workers, including bar and restaurant employees, people like me, from the poisons of tobacco smoke."

The fate of Maryland's smokefree workplace proposal is expected to rest largely with Senate President Mike Miller, who has opposed smokefree workplace legislation in the past but did not indicate his position today.

"People live and learn," says Joe Cherner, president of SmokeFree Educational Services, Inc., the nation's largest smokefree advocacy group. "Perhaps Senator Miller has learned something that he didn't know before. We've seen many legislators come onboard in recent years when they learn about diseases caused by tobacco smoke."

If Maryland passes smokefree workplace legislation, it will become the nation's 7th smokefree workplace state joining California, Delaware, New York, Connecticut, Maine, and Massachusetts. Other states, such as Florida, Vermont, and Utah, have passed partial smokefree workplace laws, addressing restaurants but not bars.

Earlier this year, Montgomery County (Maryland's wealthiest county), passed comprehensive smokefree workplace legislation. Talbot County (MD) is expected to join them shortly.