Smoking ban has Appleton (Wisconsin) fuming

THE CAPITAL TIMES ^ | 08/02/2005 | AP

[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.

[Gabz]

Get it yet? (don't use the liberal's SHS health arguments on me. They are BS and have nothing to do with this issue in the first place.)

You're right SHS is all BS...........but the libs all claim the high road that this is all about health and the SHS BS is actually the equivalent of gospel truth. And we have seen that frquently on this thread :)

[jjmcgo]

Don't worry, the states and feds have been reimbursed through the tobacco settlement for all damages past, present and future.
Any further claim by states, pols or ax grinders is merely an attempt at double-dipping. Smokers cost you nothing. They've already paid for generations past, present and future.
And they pay a lot more than smoking damage. They pay too much of general revenues. A lot of the tobacco settlement money was misdirected to general revenues in an effort to keep you from voting the pols out of office.
If smokers ever did quit and you had to pay your fair share of taxes, you would turn on these politicians with a vengeance.

[quietolong]

And what are the Republicans doing?

Making a State wide ban. So these lefty busy bodies can spread there socialism.

They should be making a law that prohibits these bans. Not the other way around.

Hey Republicans! ( knock knock knock) Hello! The people who support these thing vote RAT! There never going to vote for you.

And no I do not smoke Never have never will.

[jjmcgo]

Apparently those smoker-free bars in LA and NYC are also European tourist-free bars too, according to published articles quoting European travel agencies. Europeans are asking travel agents which states haven't banned smoking and are avoiding those that do.

[jjmcgo]

The list of people we pay for through Medicare and Medicaid are endless. We pay for the people who work 60+ hours a week and suffer the predicted stress-related illnesses. We pay for clean-livers who spend a decade in nursing homes with Alzheimers, etc.
Let's not turn on each other for totalitarian reasons.

[Chena]

"The list of people we pay for through Medicare and Medicaid are endless. We pay for the people who work 60+ hours a week and suffer the predicted stress-related illnesses. We pay for clean-livers who spend a decade in nursing homes with Alzheimers, etc.
Let's not turn on each other for totalitarian reasons."

I'm not sure what I said that inspired you to write, "Let's not turn on each other for totalitarian reasons", but if I mispoke somewhere I do apologize.

Yes, "the list of people we pay for through Medicare and Medicaid are endless", I agree with that and your other examples as well. I used people who over-indulge in food and the medical consequences of that behaviour as another example.

[Gabz]

The smoking ban is a smokescreen for a sort-of backdoor KELO!

And a back door to a form of prohibition...........the chains will be the only ones left with liquor licenses, which can be controlled even more than they are now.

[Gabz]

LOL!!!!

Even with our recent tax increase, and the sales tax - my cigs are still cheaper in Virginia :)

[jjmcgo]

Good argument, Coloradan.
The whole topic might boil down to this simple thought:
Smoking doesn't smell as bad as totalitarianism which has killed more people than smoking ever will.

[Gabz]

Smoking doesn't smell as bad as totalitarianism which has killed more people than smoking ever will.

Unfortunately there are far too many people, including many here at FR that will disagree with you on this point.

[jjmcgo]

You should run away. You got your a** kicked today by people far more intelligent than you.
Let's keep the commies off this freedom-oriented website.

[Gabz]

These smoking ban threads are an easy means of ferreting out the commies, socialists, leftists and DU wannabes...........they are very easy to spot.

[bfree]

Almost as good as the anti Walmart threads. LOL!!! Good to see you here too.

[coloradan]

I have seen many non-smokers on this, and other threads who do like the smoke-free atmosphere (that's fine) but are totally against the idea of the forced bans that created it. I have no problem with those folks.

This describes me perfectly. I do dislike smoking atmospheres, but I really, really hate the mindset (and legislative intentions) of the anti-smoking Nazis. I would much rather have smokers in my midst than totalitarians in my government.

[coloradan]

Thanks, and bingo.

[razoroccam]

"If smokers ever did quit and you had to pay your fair share of taxes, you would turn on these politicians with a vengeance."

I am already paying more than my fair share in taxes, which is one reason why I am on this board and not DU. Damned tax brackets.

[sheltonmac]

By claiming property rights, you are using that to deflect criticism away from your inability to recognize other peoples rights - the right to be safe from bodily harm and the preservation of their own personal property.

You and your heroes in the legislature have no concept of property rights. If you did, you'd be just as outraged about this as anyone, whether you smoke or not.

Not one person was forced to breathe secondhand smoke. Not a single one. Bar and restaurant workers didn't have to seek employment in an establishment that allowed smoking. Customers did not have to patronize businesses that allowed smoking. Why is this such a difficult concept for you to grasp? Why do you have to run whining and crying to the nanny state every time you see something you don't like?

I just don't get it. I really don't.

[ErnBatavia]

The socialists will tell you that things will adjust soon, but I can attest that here in California it's been well over five years since the clamp went on...such businesses NEVER recover.

[Chena]

We'll never be able to understand what sort of demons lurk in the minds of some folks, sheltonmac. It looks like MplsSteve has left the building. Perhaps smoked out by the honest, thoughtful and truthful commentary posted by our fellow FReepers on this thread.

I believe it is possible that MplsSteve believes in private property rights, but when it comes to smoking bans, he's more than willing to make an exception. He fails to understand that trampling on one person's freedom opens the door to other stampedes. The next time, he may be the one trampled on.

Perhaps that is why he refused to answer my simple question about basic private property rights. That fact tells much about him. He believes in his freedoms, just not everyone else's.

[Hot Tabasco]

I love the smoking ban in Hennepin County

Gosh Steve, guess this was all about you wasn't it? No matter how much we smokers have compromised with you folks over the past 25 years, it still wasn't enough for you was it?Ignore private property rights, just get your clean air!

So tell me Stevie, when you aren't there to make up for the smokers who have been banned, who is taking up your slack? Furthermore, how are the neighborhood bars where the poor folks who could care less about second hand smoke and your elitist attitudes doing Stevie?

Yes sir Stevie, you and your ilk are certainly doing these neighborhood pubs a real big favor aren't you???

FWIW Stevie, drop by the bar I hang out in sometime and lets discuss your issues with smoking. I won't kick your a$$ but everyone else in the bar will.....................