Posted on 06/10/2004 8:20:25 AM PDT by fight_truth_decay
SARATOGA SPRINGS -- According to a report conducted for bar owners in the state, the workplace smoking ban enacted last year led to the loss of 2,000 industry jobs and millions of dollars in wages.
Ridgewood Economic Associates of New Jersey conducted the study for New York Nightlife Association based in New York City, and the Empire State Restaurant and Tavern Association based in Albany.
The report stated that since the state's Clean Indoor Act took effect on July 24 banning smoking in all workplaces, $28.5 million in wages and salary payments and $37 million in gross state product were lost in the industry.
Ridgewood, which used data from the state Department of Labor, also found that businesses that supply bars have also suffered losses to the tune of 650 jobs, $21.5 million in wages and $34.5 million in gross state product.
Saratoga County has shown little evidence of economic loss, though, according to the state Department of Health, which grants waivers to businesses that show a 15 percent decline in profits since the ban. Only two bars have applied: Connie's Roadhouse in Moreau, which was granted a waiver in April, and the Alley Bar in Saratoga Springs which was denied one.
Janine Stuchin, project coordinator with the Adirondack Tobacco Free Network's southern region base on Phila Street, said she's surprised at the complaints from bar owners.
'I think things are going very well,' she said. 'I continue to hear from the public of their support.'
Even if bars are hurting, she said, it's a public health issue. 'The ban is designed to protect workers from secondhand smoke,' she said.
Suzanne Dormandy, manager Tin & Lint on Caroline Street, said no one has lost their job over the ban, but business is hurting.
'It's supposedly for the employees' health, but now we can't afford health care,' she said.
Dormandy said in a tourist city like Saratoga Springs, when patrons go out for a cigarette, they drift like smoke into another bar.
A bill lingering in the state Legislature, sponsored by Assemblywoman RoAnn Destito, D-Rome, and Sen. Raymond Meier, R-Western, calls for pool halls, bowling alleys and bars (a business where food sale is incidental) to be allowed a separate room with air filtration for smoking.
Assemblyman Roy McDonald, R-Wilton, said he hadn't studied the bill yet, but that something had to be done to equalize waiver granting.
'It's got to be more structured,' he said. 'What do you say to the ones that don't get it?'
Coldspring Volunteer Fire Dept. Tavern 50% 75% 1 Steamburg NY
"The fire department owns the bar. Money from the bar buys equipment for the fire department. The income has been cut in half. This money buys new ambulances, trucks, gear ect. Remember, this all volunteer. Without the bar money we are going to have to rely on the town for revenue. You may lose your house or even someone's life without the money for the equipment..."
pulled from the chart mentioned above..
A government that is so mistrusted that it requires a search warrant to enter a property is among the worst to decide that strangers must be given access to a person's property/business. No person is forced to breath smoke for they are at all times free to walk out the door.
The New York Night Life Association is armed with a petition addressed to Gov. Pataki, Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, and Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno signed by 40,000 from bar patrons and workers - one-quarter from New York City - asking that smoking be permitted in air-filtered bars.
Almost a year after Mayor Bloomberg's smoking ban went into effect on July 24, 2003, New York City bars are still feeling the economic burn.
"The city's bars lose on average an estimated 15 to 19 percent in revenues because of the ban," said Brian Nolan, executive director of United Restaurant & Tavern Owners of New York, Inc.
Interviews with more than a dozen bar owners and managers conducted by The Post show the revenue loss is often even more extreme.
The $3,500 gizmo - so named because it cleans 1,000 cubic feet of air per minute - can eliminate 99 percent of cigarette smoke in a matter of minutes.
Manufactured by Illinois company Airistar(hmm wonder if they are a public company), it's equipped with wheels for mobility and can blend into the background of a bar as a table. http://www.nypost.com/news/regionalnews/24153.htm
"These state-of-the-art filters make room air cleaner than what you breathe outside," New York Night Life Association spokesman Basil Anastassiou said after a recent demonstration in the office of Assemblywoman RoAnn Destito (D-Rome). State Sen. Raymond Meier (R-Western) is also sponsoring a similar bill
| Cork and Bottle Tavern | Closed | 100% | 100% | Potville | NY | ||
| Located near the PA border, this was literally a Mom and Pop business, run by a couple with no employees to "protect." | |||||||
Businesses harmed by smoking Bans - The Facts on second hand smoke
OMG! This list is getting HUGE! What a pitiful situation for all these business's to be in.
A VERY large list there, and I am afraid that a lot more are going to follow. Pity!
As if these clowns care.
They're just ecstatic to see bars start closing. That's their goal, the ban is a nice trojan horse.
Even some nonsmokers are waking up to the fact.
As much as I can, I boycott them, one individual won't make much of a difference and once our statewide ban goes thru, it'll all be moot anyway.
Society prospered without those laws because adults were treated like adults.
Parents were also considered the best people to raise and instill values in their own children.
Those seem to be radical ideas these days.
The list might appear long now, but many do not even know about this group collecting data...is only a sampling to date.
Check out my one page about the smoking bans and business closures. Might be something there you or "the group" could add to The Facts.
I just got back from being in Delaware......and was totally shocked on my ride home to see one of the long time establishments shuttered with not only a for sale sign out from.....but a sign announcing the auction of the contents.
This place was in business for 50 years......just a couple of miles from the maryland line....no one can tell me that the Delaware smoking ban had no hand in the closing of this place.
Oh sure! And the anti's are telling the business owner's they will be rolling with revenue when the smoker's are removed. Yea, right! :(
Can't they sue for "breach of contract?" Something should be done about this!
This is the 6 or 7th place I know of personally that either has closed it's doors or has been sold because of the ban....and none of them fall in to the category of new businesses failures.
And if I am personally aware of that many - you can figure there are a whole lot more.
That reporter is either lazy, or lying, or both.
I've been keeping an unoffical list of place that have been harmed, many to the point of closing, beucase of the ban. If this so called journalist had spent five minutes on Google, he would have found it here. Note how many of the closed bars are in NYC, including one that had been in business for thirty years, and another that had been around for more than a century. They survied prohibiton, but couldn't survive the nicotine nannies.
Thanks, BTW, to the folks who are posting things from that list. Please keep doing that - that's exaclty what it's for.
>"The city's Health Department, which enforces the smoking ban,
> has also analyzed monthly employment numbers and found no
> overall job loss in the food service and drinking industry."
>Throws out the claim by a previous poster that jobs were lost.
The Health Department, which created the ban, claims that there was no ill effect from it. How stupid would someone have to be to consider them a credible source?
(That's a rehetorical question.)
(That means you're not supposed to answer it.)
>OMG! This list is getting HUGE! What a pitiful situation for all these business's to be in.
>A VERY large list there, and I am afraid that a lot more are going to follow. Pity!
And I'm just one guy who put out a request saying "send me info." This is not anything offcial, or anywhere close to comprehsnive, but the list grows by one - three entries every day. (I don't update it that often, though - I put a new one up every couple of weeks.)
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