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.
Would you like to be added to my RUSH IN A HURRY PING list?
It seems to me that Rush’s words above are coming to fruition.
Isn’t that what PARENTS do to their CHILDREN? LOL.
Sure! Add me please!
Yes, to an extent. The missing connection is LOVE, here. In the circumstances about which I speak there is no love.
>>first one’s crying the blues
That’s why in a perverse way, I’m looking forward, well, not quite that eager, to the plethora of restrictions and taxes and fees that will come outta this whole CapNTrade thingie from Waxman and Markey.
No. :-)
Uh...it's not like socialists and control freaks are mutually exclusive.
Not by a long shot.
I’ll add you to our MICHELLE FASHION POLICE ALERT PING list instead. :-)
Yeah, I know.
I just wanted to use the words “CONTROL FREAKS” for added emphasis.
Anything else you want banned while you are at it?
I'd kinda like to be on that one.
Or is it the "Good Grief, What on Earth is Michelle Wearing Now?" list?
Where were these restaurant owners when there were public hearings on this law?
I didn’t see them - I was there...
The law also makes it illegal to smoke in any hotel room in Boston and also on loading docks.
Boston = The InHospitality City
It will also destroy the Convention Trade.
Being southern, I totally get that one.
Or as my dear departed southern lady of a mother would say...."Oh, dear."
I will add you to the Fashion Police list, if you’d like.
Oh, by the way, Nancy Regan to lunch with Michelle at the White House tomorrow.
>>Anything else you want banned while you are at it?
YES! Not only bans, but some improvements to America’s QOL.
-Excessive food portions in restaurants.
-Unrestricted gasoline sales to individuals.
-Smart Thermostats to keep indoor temperatures at a federally prescribed level.
-Plastic bags and paper bags. Bring your own when you food shop.
-Mandatory car pooling.
-Helmetless drivers in cars.
-Food animals that cause global warming and pollution.
-A tax on packaged foods.
I’ll come up with more.
{Snicker!}
Here’s another snicker for everyone:
RUSH PIMPS SMOKING.
That’s a standard line.
LOL! I saw that.
That is something.
I never thought of taxing frying oil.
See, when you put your mind to it, there’s virtually nothing that’s not taxable.
And now, we even have the capacity, like in the old Monty Python skit, to tax “thingie”.
Why should people who have consistent orgasms not be taxed?
Huh? Huh? Why not. If freedom ain’t free, neither should orgasms. And don’t red herring me that men pay. The money goes to the woman, not the government. Both parties should pay.
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