Smoke-free bars & clubs? Yes

NY Daily ^ | 10/10/02 | JOSEPH W. CHERNER

[Tumbleweed_Connection]

Bar and restaurant employes are forced to inhale tobacco smoke every day to keep their jobs. According to studies by the city Health Department, secondhand smoke kills more than 1,000 New Yorkers each year. A smoky bar can have 40 times more air pollution than the Holland Tunnel at rush hour. Today, the City Council will hear testimony on Mayor Bloomberg's proposal to make all city workplaces smoke-free. Testimony supporting the bill, much like letters sent through smokefree.org to public officials, will make it clear that the health of bar and restaurant employees is just as important as the health of everyone else.

One pregnant member of Bar and Restaurant Employees Advocating Together for a Healthy Environment - BREATHE - writes: "I have been a bartender at a restaurant for the past two years. During the course of working there, I discovered that I was two months pregnant. I immediately stopped working, but my unborn child had been exposed to two months of smoke. I have never smoked a day in my life, and I only pray that this does not have a negative effect on my baby."

One person who has worked for 20 years as a waiter and bartender asks, "What did I do that is so wrong that I must decide between having a decent-paying job that I enjoy and substantially increasing my risk of cancer and lung disease? All I want is the same right to a safe, smoke-free workplace that millions of other workers enjoy. People who work in bars, restaurants and nightclubs ... deserve a safe, healthy, smoke-free workplace, too."

The city's biggest labor unions, from 1199 to the United Federation of Teachers, and the fire officers' union and the transport workers' union, support smoke-free workplace legislation for all New York City workers.

The president of Local 802, Associated Musicians of Greater New York, which represents 10,000 professional musicians who often work in smoky restaurants, bars and clubs, writes, "The health of all workers is equally important. No one should be allowed to make someone else sick. Unfortunately, most of our members have the choice of either working in a smoke-filled room or not working at all."

These people are right. Bartenders, waiters and musicians deserve the same right to a safe, smoke-free workplace that everyone else won long ago. No worker should have to breathe something that causes cancer to hold a job or have to give up a job to prevent getting sick.

Clean indoor air is a basic right to which all workers should be entitled. Let's hope City Council Speaker Gifford Miller (D-Manhattan) backs Bloomberg and supports the Smoke-Free Workplace Act of 2002 for the health of all New Yorkers.

[HIDEK6]

Very few musicians are non-smokers.

I think you are pulling this assertion out of thin air. While I'm on the same side of this smoking thing that you are, you don't help the cause by doing what you accuse the other side of doing.

[maxwell]

Awright y'all, this armchair is MINE. Anybody who touches it gets bitten. YeeHA.

[Max McGarrity]

I admittedly don't know many musicians, maybe two dozen in all; some play bars and some play in orchestras. Of those, probably half smoke...tobacco or ? I do know, however, that studies show a far greater percentage of hospitality workers are smokers than in the general population.

[Great Dane]

you don't help the cause by doing what you accuse the other side of doing.

My statement is from personal experience, knew a lot of musicians, can you prove otherwise. ?

[SheLion]

Written by Joe Cherner himself. The biggest Anti Smoker working with Bloomberg on the East Coast!

Ahhhhh, Joe Cherner. The "alernate lifestyle" guy trying to tell the REST of us how to live, when in fact, most of us detest HIS lifestyle. That's for sure.

[SheLion]

Barbra streisand music makes me ill.

Barbra Streisand makes ME ill, PERIOD! Barbara Barf Alert!

[SheLion]

Very few musicians are non-smokers.

You got THAT right! I've worked with a lot of bands in my life, and they all smoked! It's part of the business!

(courtesy of metesky)

[HIDEK6]

Very few musicians are non-smokers.

I hate getting distracted by all this smoking vs anti-smoking bullshit, but I can't bear ignorance.

I have played the piano at a high professional level for 36 years. Most of the musicians with whom I have performed do not smoke, but are not anal about it. I guess the total number involved here is approximately 83, 70 of whom do not smoke. However, they do not view the other 13 as either pariahs or people that they'd rather not be around.

The musicians of my acquaintance have more important things to do than be concerned about smoking.