Posted on 08/02/2005 10:24:13 AM PDT by Extremely Extreme Extremist
APPLETON (AP) - At Jokers Bar, the staff of eight has been laid off. Owner Tony Schaefer said he's now working the bar with his brother.
Schaefer is among many business owners still fuming a month after a ban on smoking at all indoor workplaces was enacted in this city.
The ban was approved by 56 percent of voters in an April 5 referendum and went into effect on July 1. Madison's similar smoking ban went into effect on the same day, although there was no referendum preceding it.
"We'll be closing up" if business doesn't improve, Schaefer said. "The sad thing is we don't even know if anyone would buy it."
Some say they have reason to fume.
Nearly three-quarters of the 64 businesses that responded to a request from the Appleton Post-Crescent reported sluggish sales in the past month, most from 10 to 40 percent lower compared with last July. Some reported sales off as much as 70 percent.
Many tavern owners in Madison have made similar complaints, and sympathetic members of the City Council have already tried once, unsuccessfully, to repeal the ban.
More than 30 tavern owners in Appleton have filed a lawsuit to repeal the ban, and the Common Council this month is expected to review a proposal that would exempt taverns and bar areas of restaurants, similar to a measure proposed statewide.
For now, sales are down 35 percent at Shark's Club Billiards Bar and Grill, owner Mitchell Roepke said.
"We're a blue-collar, working-class establishment and they're the smokers. ... I'm losing $11,000 in sales in July," Roepke said.
But Connie Olson, executive director of Community Action for Tobacco Free Living, a group that pushed for the ban, said some of the negative talk becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.
"All customers hear are bartenders complaining. Who wants to hear that?" Olson said. "They have to get past this personal vendetta. Don't do that to customers. They need to promote their businesses as smoke-free."
Restaurants reported faring better than bars.
Family restaurants like Applebee's and Perkins, and upscale places like Black and Tan, where smoking had previously been allowed at the bar, saw no ill effect in their July revenues.
At The Bar in downtown Appleton, regular lunchtime diner Carl Schuh of Black Creek compared before and after.
"It's cleaner, fresher and airier," he said.
Several businesses said they were boosting advertising and offering specials to encourage customers to come back, while still lobbying officials for a reversal on the ban.
Actually, in the smoking issue, it's closer to three wolves and one sheep...
Shove it yourself.
You do not have the right to use a dangerous product anywhere and at anytime of your choosing...if it endangers others.
There's nothing in the world you can say that will justify your so-called "right" to inflict harm on others.
You (or anyone) has the absolute right to kill themselves. You do not have the right to take others with you.
Go away now!
I do not smoke..in fact, my mother died of lung cancer, and I do will go into places that allow smoking, HOWEVER, I do not agree with government mandated rules such as these. Folks who go into a bar, should be free to smoke.
At least the folks there got to VOTE on the matter...in my home town the silly liberals on the city council voted to end all indoor smoking, all the while happily handing out alcohol permits (every 20 seconds someone in this country is killed by a drunk driver)....
I am not suggesting prohobition, just that these silly liberals latch onto junk science, and do the "vogue" thing, and outlaw smoking...if they REALLY cared about people, the evidence of damage done by drinking is statiscally provable, while the second hand smoke hysteria is not probable...just silly "feel-good" liberalism.
"please list the post where anyone has suggested that you should"
No one has. That is the good thing about FR - folks here, for the most part, take responsibility for their actions.
Similarly, I have never said I approve of the legislation banning smoking in private businesses. Show me where I said I do.
My bug is about low taxes and smaller government, not the other way around.
"Are you fu**ing kidding me?
Trying to tie this issue to the Kelo decision?!
Go away."
Is the denial of a few rights to a lot of property owners less evil than the denial of all rights to a few property owners? Per your posts, I'm guessing you would answer this in the affirmative. As a result, incremental tyranny is the path you prefer. I happen to disagree.
"What really gets me is the absolute blindness expressed on these threads by supposed small government loving conservatives who are all in favor of this nonsense."
It proves that personal bias is an affliction found both in liberals and conservatives. I think most, if not all, of those who support the non-smoking bans in private establishments do so because they simply dislike smoke. Their personal bias on this issue blinds them to the greater, and most important issue of private property rights.
Probably not; but the problem is that the Smoking Taliban are not happy with "just" 75%.
I love Free Republic...except when the idiot strain of political paranoia blows up especially in instances like this. I know it when I see, the code word "slippery slope" comes to mind.
People like muself know our rights and respect others rights. I do not respect or acknowledge someone's "right" to inflict bodily harm on me.
And no, I shouldn't have to go elsewhere just to please a small group of people who are hell-bent on exercsing their rights to the detriment of others.
I like your attitude. You can have all the chocolate you want. But the next person who complains about my smoking has to eat cold pasty oatmeal, with fat free milk. No, water. Yeah.
Who's afflicting what on whom? When you walk into a bar that has smokers, YOU are self-inflicting the harm. Are you not?
This 'property rights' stuff is pretty tough to grasp.
My mistake, buddy. We agree, then.
If a bar's customer base had more non-smokers than smokers, the smoking ban would not have had such a great affect on their profits. Therefore, the customer base of most bars appears to have more smokers than non-smokers. This would indicate that a MINORITY has taken away the rights of the MAJORITY>
Others would say that the smoking ban is in place because a MAJORITY of the voters voted for it. What they fail to realize, is that it was the MINORITY, and their special interest groups, who obtained and/or bought those votes.
The fact remains that a minority, in this particular situation, has taken away the freedoms of a majority.
"Ooooo We've taken care of everything, the words you read- the songs you sing-- the pictures that give pleasure to your eye.
It's all for one, and one for all.
We work together common sons.
Never need to wonder how or why."
-- Rush.
Points these selfish thugs refuse to acknowlege.
Most of these smoking bans cover ALL places of business, far beyond just bars and restaurants.....yet it is OK to tell a person they can not smoke in their private office, even in some cases where that office in is the person's own home.
What I would like to know is if these people are so fired up about having smoke free places to work or play they don't open up their own - instead of forcing themselves upon people willing to invest their money and take take the risk what they are supposed to do.
Guess again. The problem is rabid smokers like yourselves.
The kind who feels it is their God-given right to smoke whenever and wherever they want to...everyone else be damned.
People like you are the reason there are smoking bans. Your ignorance and disdain for the rights of others has caused this.
The world is changing (and no, it's not a UN-sponsored conspiracy either - so get off the political paranoia kick that other have espoused on here) and you better get fu**ing used to it.
You'll always have your rights. But the days of being able to blow your right in eveeryone else's face is over! Get it?!
I asked this question earlier on this thread, MplsSteve, and would like to present it to you.
If you take "smoking" out of the equation here, and look at only the issue of private property rights, would you still agree with these sort of bans?
Do you believe that a private business owner has the right to establish and conduct his business in a way that he/she chooses to?
You have absolutely no clue of what you are talking about and are proving it with each and every more ridiculous post you make.
You people just slay me!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
"You do not have the right to use a dangerous product anywhere and at anytime of your choosing...if it endangers others."
Does that include private property, as in someone's own home or property?
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