But for smoking outdoors in Maine:
Posted on 06/02/2009 11:35:55 AM PDT by swarthyguy
Hub bar and restaurant owners are burning up over the city’s sudden crackdown on puffing patrons on rooftop decks or in sidewalk cafes as part of the city’s tough new workplace smoking rules.
“We used to have a patio full of people, smokers and others who don’t smoke but are socializing with them,” said George Lewis, owner of The Foundation Lounge at the Hotel Commonwealth in Kenmore Square. “Now it’s empty.”
Lewis is among a group of tavern owners considering challenging the new smoking restriction in court. They fear the ban, coupled with an increased meals tax, will scare away customers at a time when profits are already suffering due to the economy.
“I’m afraid we’re going to lose business,” said Tony Castagnozzi of the Rattlesnake Bar and Grill on Bolyston Street. “People will say, ‘Screw it. We’ll go out of town to a place where we can have dinner and a cigar outside.’ It just makes it tougher and tougher to do business in the city.”
Last month, city inspectors began visiting the 250 or so bars and cafes with decks and patios, handing out warning letters and putting proprietors on notice that they face costly fines - $200 for a first offense, $700 for a second and $1,000 for a third - if customers are caught smoking in any “adjacent outdoor area” served by staff.
Boston Public Health Commission spokeswoman Ann Scales said after the educational outreach ends in the coming weeks, the city will begin enforcing the smoking ban in earnest by handing out violations. ‘We don’t pass regulations that we don’t enforce,” she said, adding that chronic violations could affect a bar’s liquor license.
Angry publicans say they were caught off guard by the measure, which got little attention in December when the city, which banned smoking inside restaurants and bars in 2003, enacted some of the toughest smoking restrictions in the country.
The outdoor-workplace smoking ban was tucked into the new regulations, which included a proposal to extinguish cigar bars that made national headlines. The issue sparked a fight from smoking bars that led to a 10-year reprieve.
But bar owners did little to protest the outdoor ban and are now scrambling to deal with what Castagnozzi calls “a manager and doorman’s nightmare.” On some nights, as many as 50 people stand in line waiting to get upstairs to the Rattlesnake’s popular roof deck. “Now anyone wanting to smoke will have to go back down the line and outside to smoke. When they come back, people will be like, ‘Who are you?’ ’ he said.
We’re all gonna die!!!
Sad little people with sad little lives.
But for smoking outdoors in Maine:
And I thought I had a sad and little life. Gees.
:O)
HG secretly worships Rush. You can tell by her posts.
A “RUSH CRUSH?”
COOL!
No, the mayor is dead wrong. The millions spent in the city would result in enough income that city taxes on that alone would make up for the cost. On top of that, it would have helped the struggling restaurants, hotels, etc. Very short sighted. Word is NJ is actively trying to get the tall ships to go there next year instead. Classic case of cutting off the city’s nose to spite its face...
“Boston Public Health Commission spokeswoman Ann Scales said after the educational outreach ends in the coming weeks, the city will begin enforcing the smoking ban in earnest by handing out violations. ‘We don’t pass regulations that we don’t enforce,” she said, adding that chronic violations could affect a bar’s liquor license.”
Is this a line out of “Atlas Shrugged?”
“Whine, all you owners.”
Yep, screw the property owners. Heck, let’s just confiscate all private property and give it over to management control.
Are you also a supporter of the Kelo decision?
“A moot point, but I was one of those in favor of letting individual establishments and proprietors decide.”
Doh, with this clarification I retract my previous post. Have a good on.
“They’re not socialists, they’re CONTROL FREAKS.”
Correct, and that makes them fascists. I don’t use that term lightly.
“Today smokers, tomorrow - drivers, eaters.”
Actually, yesterday smokers and today bible studiers:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2261022/posts
The righteous right who applauds the infringement of private property will get beaten with the same wip.
From “Today’s Word With Joel Olsteen.”
“It was for freedom that Christ set us free; therefore keep standing firm and do not be subject again to a yoke of slavery” (Galatians 5:1, NAS).
buy stock in nicorette.....lol
Yes -- and keep a private supply of the stuff so that we can make money as nicotine drug dealers!
"Need a fix, honey? Here's your nicorette at $50 a chew." lol
>>In a free country.
IRAQ!
>.destroy the Convention Trade.
You think so. The majority do not indulge and don’t really care what happens to those who do.
Smokers have adjusted with the patch and gum and don’t even bother to use anywhere near anything.
But, you can bet these scumbag whiners of owners were all on board for the inital bans; now that the logical extension is made, outdoors, they find their voice.
They had no problem with shoving people outdoors during the balmy months of a Boston winter! Now, they’ll just raise the prices of their overpriced drinks to outrageous. Screw ‘em.
I can see some resistance among overseas types, but even that is diminishing. The loading docks clause is a real doozy! Safer Still. Boy, what would we do without these busybodies.
Sheesh, 250 bucks a night for a hotel room, you can have booze, a hooker but not a smoke.
Tell me we’re a sane country. I won’t believe you.
But then again, since the bans have gone in, the happiness level of Americans has gone through the roof, not to mention the drastic drop in childhood asthma and other respiratory diseases, even among adults. What’s not to like. Just because something like 50 million people are treated like outcasts and lepers, denied the right of assembly with likeminded types in their own, well...country is not reason enough to rethink the righteousness of the bans.
It’s a shame we smokers brought down the WTC.
>>A few years ago a lunatic state rep here proposed a 5-cent deposit on cigarette butts.
Not a bad idea. Return your used butts to a Fed/StateButtRecyclingCenter. Get a dollar for 20, like bottles.
I like it.
Oh look, another nico-nazi faux conservative.
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