Posted on 09/05/2001 10:32:26 AM PDT by Just another Joe
Kenosha - A little more than three months after it took effect, the city's ban on smoking in restaurants is running into trouble.
As many as 41 restaurants plan to apply for a two-year exemption from the ban because of the impact it has had on business, according to an accountant for the establishments. Two have already done so.
The restaurants qualify for the exemption because sales at each have dropped at least 10% in the ordinance's first three months, said accountant Stanley Ginkowski. The businesses, mostly family-style restaurants and coffeehouses, blame the smoking ban for the decline, he said.
According to the ordinance, a business is eligible for a one-time, maximum two-year exemption if revenue decreases 10% or more in a three-month period compared with the same time in the previous three years. Restaurants that apply for an exemption must receive the City Council's approval.
If the exemptions are sought and granted, they would effectively gut the new ordinance, Ald. Steve Casey said Tuesday.
"This is a mess the city got themselves into, and it'll be interesting to see how they wiggle their way out," he said.
Casey voted against the ordinance when it was adopted last fall in part because the measure included a series of amendments designed to broaden support for the proposal. Instead, the amendments created confusion, enforcement problems and disparities between restaurants and taverns that serve food, Casey said.
Two Kenosha restaurants - both co-owned by Wisconsin Restaurant Association President Gary Anderson of Kenosha - were granted exemptions last week by the City Council.
The next day, employees at Andy's Restaurant and Andy's Drive-in immediately reinstituted their smoking and non-smoking sections.
Andy's Restaurant lost slightly more than 10% of its sales after the ban, prompting the restaurant to buy less from suppliers and cut employees' hours, co-owner Bill Anderson said.
"I've seen some of my regular customers come back that I haven't seen in three months," said Bill Anderson.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Which is why Vermont is on my list of places to never visit.
Most of the ones I know are smokers themselves.
You have detailed the situation to perfection.
The anti’s get sick and they still feel the need to blame smokers. Because the scientists can’t figure out why asthma is on the increase.
Just like airplanes. Their filters were always filthy. They went smoke free. Their filters are STILL filthy, and people are getting sick on long flights because of the impure air. They sure can’t blame THAT on the smokers anymore, can they.
Sorry, but I have no sympathy for the whiners. Where were they when they could have actually done something ... when the law was still pending legislation? I suppose better late than never. But business people are going to have to fight for their own survivial if they don't want to be buried by government regulations. They can start by not voting for socialists.
If there was no smoking ban they would all be on an even playing field also. Let the market economy make the decision.
It's possible that the downturn in the economy is affecting it, I suppose.
If this is the case shouldn't it also affect eateries in states that still allow smoking? It's only logical.
It turns out that most AAA travel agents had billed the trip as "a nice, non-smoking tour of Spain, Morocco, and Portugal." Yeah, right.
Get a grip, AAA. Spaniards, Portuguese and Moroccans SMOKE. A LOT. Everywhere. There IS no non-smoking section. There are NO non-smoking hotel rooms. And you would not have believed the hue and cry. These tourists were aghast - AGHAST, I say - that these Spaniards, Portuguese, and Moroccans would DARE to smoke "around them." They whined and complained, and all the Tour Director (a Madrilleno with English as a second language) could do was to tell them, "Well, in es-Spain, people SMOKE." This guy talked a big anti-smoking drill and then bummed Marlboros from me. He said that Trafalgar had told him to bad-rap smoking because the AAA had sent a bunch of non-smokers on the tour.
One red-headed gal who puffed like the Komodo Dragon at the Madrid airport was never seen smoking the entire trip - until, when she thought the entire group was off visiting some archaic castle, she decided she could do so. I just so happened to NOT be with the group and came across her.
"I thought you gave that up at the Madrid airport," I said to her. She replied that she didn't want others on the tour to "think badly of her."
I said, "Sweety, I've got an advantage you don't have. I'm old, and I don't give a flyin' patooie what any of them think." She didn't know what to say.
Which is just as well.
Michael
Restaurants are private property. If we were still living under the U.S. Constitution, owners of private property would be able to choose who shall and shall not be allowed on their private property.
Applied to the particular situation, you'd have smoke-free restaurants booming to cater to that segment of the population, leaving the old-smoker restaurants to cater to that niche. And it would all happen without coercion ... and without regulation.
Unfortunately, liberals couldn't wait for free people and free markets to react ... and instead decided to impose regulations on owners of private property to cater to only a specific segment of the population - the non-smoker.
BTW, I am not a smoker.
Ahhhh. That pesky law of unintended consequences. D@mn myopic libs.
Vermont? Isn't that the State that made same sex marriages legal? Yes, what happens in Vermont is VERY important to me, NOT!
You may not be a smoker but you are SURE not a nico-nazi trying to run anybodys life either.
If we had more NONSMOKERS like you that 'get it' this wouldn't be a problem.
I have nothing to hide. I smoke where ever I am able.
One thing about being a smoker: we can be out in the public and not bitch about ANY of them. Right? :)
In one Maryland community, the liberal anti-Smoking Nazis weren't satisfied with smoke-free restaurants. They were going to ban smoking outdoors anywhere within the limits of the town. So for those of you who think coercive liberals plan on stopping at restaurants ... or just with smoking, think again. It's already started with car phones. Next will be donuts or listening to the radio. Don't laugh. WHen liberals run out of causes, they pursue really stupid things - all having coercion in common (e.g. reparations).
But, times are a changin, and we are working our butts off trying to stop all the discrimination against smokers, and the Junk Science.
I didn't see that. That makes it tougher. Then we need to change what we sell or cut hours for a three month period. It shouldn't be too costly to close up during the slowest times to be sure to qualify for the two year exemption. Assuming this was a blanket deal and I qualified for the exemption I could earn myself the right to have the only smoking restaurant in the area just by closing on Monday for three months. After the down time I would be back and running with my own little monopoly.
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