Posted on 06/28/2006 2:40:06 AM PDT by SheLion
STEAMBOAT SPRINGS — Saturday marks the one-year anniversary of Steamboat Springs' controversial municipal smoking ban, but local businesses that once catered to the smoker's dollar have no reason to celebrate.
Mike Miller, owner of Sun�--pie's Bistro, thinks the city's ordinance goes too far, banning smoking anywhere within the restaurant or bar's liquor license boundaries.
"It's almost impossible to enforce," Miller said about enforcing a ban that encompasses Sunpie's entire 5,000-square-foot outdoor seating area along the Yampa River. "You can be 150 feet from being indoors, and you're not allowed to smoke. You can inform customers of the law and put up signs, but you turn around, and they light up."
Slopeside Grill owner Chris Corna, whose restaurant and bar boasts ideal après-ski real estate, agreed with Miller.
"I said from the beginning that they were going a little overboard," Corna said, referring to the City Council that passed the ordinance. As president of the Steamboat Springs Restaurant Association, he spoke to the council when the ordinance was proposed. "It's not against the law to smoke. If they can't smoke inside, they should at least be able to smoke outside."
Because of the ban, Corna and Miller said they spend their mornings picking up cigarette butts along the edges of their properties. Corna thinks it would be more reasonable if his restaurant was subject only to the Colorado Clean Indoor Air Act that goes into effect Saturday.
The Clean Indoor Air Act -- essentially a statewide smoking ban -- prohibits smoking in public indoor areas and extends to a 15-foot radius around entryways, making it possible for owners such as Miller and Corna to accommodate customers who want to smoke outside rather than banishing them from their properties.
For businesses that lack exterior seatings to attract customers, the municipal ban has had a much more debilitating effect.
John Hoekstra has owned Golden Cue Billiards for 19 years. He estimated since last July's ban began, he has lost between $5,000 and $6,000 a month.
"Soon as the weather hit and it got cold in October -- bam -- there it went," Hoekstra said. "It used to be packed in here for Broncos games -- 15 to 20 people. Now I have only one or two people."
Steamboat Springs Police Department community service supervisor Tom Whiddon said most business owners have complied with the ban. Whiddon said the city has issued only a few warnings to businesses that violated the smoking ban.
"We respond if we get a complaint," Whiddon said. "We're not out there looking for every person that might be smoking and measuring the distance from the door."
Despite the statewide ban's looser regulations, restaurant and bar owners who own establishments outside of Steamboat city limits fear taking financial blows similar to Hoekstra's.
J. Elliott, owner of Oak Creek's Colorado Bar & Grill, sees the ban as government intrusion on his relationship with his customers' individual choices.
"The bar is about 47 percent of my business," Elliott said. "If this goes into effect, I'll have to make some drastic changes."
Fearing the worst, Elliott said he had his business up for sale "back in February when (the act) passed and was voted into the state Senate."
Because the Colorado Clean Air Act does not apply to casinos, cigar bars or Denver International Airport smoking lounges, Oak Creek mayor Kathy "Cargo" Rodeman had hoped a lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court would result in a temporary injunction that could save the three Oak Creek businesses that allow smoking. But on Friday, U.S. District Judge Lewis Babcock refused to delay the ban from taking effect. His ruling did not affect the lawsuit itself, which can still proceed after the ban begins.
"If it's employees they're trying to protect, why are they making the ones with the most employees exempt?" Rodeman asked. "There's more employees in one casino than every business in Oak Creek -- times 10."
Teresa Wright, Northwest Colorado Visiting Nurse Association's tobacco prevention program coordinator, is quick to cite evidence she said contradicts Rodeman's and Elliott's fears that the act will destroy Oak Creek businesses.
"All the research we have from other states is that it always results in a positive impact on the economy," Wright said about legislation aimed at increasing public health. "Costs decrease for businesses because they no longer have to pay for added insurance coverage, increased ventilation and extra effort to clean their establishment."
Rather than dreading the July 1 enactment, Wright urges smokers to seize the day as a quit date and suggests calling (800) 639-QUIT, a toll-free quit line that provides Colorado residents with free counseling and nicotine patches.
Let's see how many pond scum dwellers show themselves by responding.
That's it exactly. It would be different if these businesses were state owned, but they are private businesses with the owner being a tax paying citizen. The professional anti-smokers are WAY out of hand!
Public property: That which is purchased and maintained by tax dollars for the benefit of all people.
Private property: That which is not purchased or maintained by tax dollars and is for the benefit of the property owner.
And getting a BJ isn't having sex, either.
There'll be a whole bunch of them along pretty soon. That whole 'private property' thingy just goes right out the window on this subject, even for Freepers.
It's sad but this board has become infested with nanny state do gooders who don't give a damn about property rights.
L
As the light begins to dawn. I thought I would never see this day.
If this is a good reason to institute a smoking ban, then the bar owners would have banned smoking on their own (their right, not the city's). How forward of him to tell them not only what is good for their health, but what is good for their business as well.
I don't smoke - never have. Not even once. But this is waaayyy to far! If I own a business, and I decide to allow smoking, then that is MY business - not the business of the government! This same thing is going on in NY State. My sister lives in Upstate NY. She says "That's just the way it is". What??! Why don't they just kneel down and lick Hillary and Chuckie's hand and thank her for saving them?! But that's NY - isn't Colorado a RED state? What I want to know is, what are the people of COLORADO doing about this ban?! Are they just going to take this?!
Plus there's another segment of unprincipled "Freepers" that would expose their pond scum affiliation when they realize that post 4 doesn't differentiate what substance is being smoked.
I typed for a pulmonologist 10 years ago, and he felt just like the attorney general. I could see im the reports that if a lung cancer patient had been in a car for 10 minutes 50 years ago and someone smoked a cigarette, that was the cause of the cancer. They hate smoking so much they load the stats. I was told the doc didn't want the reports if they smelled like smoke, and i quit the job.
Now the attorney general says if you are around second hand smoke for an hour your life is over........ it's a bunch of bull.
It's sad but this board has become infested with nanny state do gooders who don't give a damn about property rights.
KNOCK KNOCK RAY. IS ANYONE HOME???? This is 'not' what Lurker meant and you know it. You are so thick, Ray! Lurker was talking about you and the anti-FReepers in here! ~tisk
KNOCK KNOCK?????
Did he want the report if the patient had AIDS lesions and pneumonia?
Just wondering why some personal risk choices are more Correct than others.
Contrast:
In Junior High our Biology text said smoking was bad, but if one must, restrict it to 7 a day. So, many were hooked.
However, if a person wants to hang around a bath house impersonating a night depository, that is noble.
Well, when it comes to smokers, even our own lawmakers turn against us. For the health of the people you know!
We see it so much, how the lawmakers promise us the moon to get our votes, but once in office, all they give us (the smokers) is the outhouse. They are sticking it to 25-30% of their constituents. I guess they don't think they need that many votes. heh!
We are getting TIRED of it!
Where did I ever call you a "jerk?" I call you IDIOT!
And if you ever did a research on Smokers Rights, you would SEE how much research that WE do and we are not just blowing smoke up your butt Ray. We just don't type empty words.
Even though that is your greatest wish!
Everything we say we can put forth a reputable link for everyone to read. We are not just pulling this stuff out of thin air. Get a grip.
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