Health groups urge Kitzhaber to veto smoking ordinance ban

By Brad Cain

Associated Press Writer

SALEM - Using e-mail and newspaper advertising, anti-smoking groups are trying to persuade Gov. John Kitzhaber to veto a bill aimed at preventing more local governments from banning smoking in bars.

Despite the pressure, Kitzhaber said Monday he plans to sign the compromise bill, which would leave in place existing smoking bans but prohibit other cities and counties from trying to snuff out bar and tavern smoking.

With an Aug. 17 deadline approaching for Kitzhaber to act on bills passed by the 2001 Legislature, a coalition of anti-smoking groups still hopes to change Kitzhaber's mind on the smoking measure, HB2828.

A full-page advertisement in Monday's Salem Statesman Journal lists the names of 63 Oregon physicians who want Kitzhaber, himself a doctor, to veto the bill because it would "sacrifice tens of thousands of workers and consumers to secondhand tobacco smoke."

At the urging of the coalition, opponents of the bill have also been making telephone calls and sending e-mail messages urging Kitzhaber to veto the bill. Kitzhaber spokesman Bob Applegate said the governor's office has gotten several hundred e-mail messages on the bill.

American Cancer Society spokesman John Valley, who's helped coordinate the effort, said the bill is poor public policy because it takes away cities' and counties' ability to protect bar employees and customers from secondhand smoke.

He noted that the prohibition on local smoking bans would apply to bowling alleys, restaurant lounges and bingo parlors - places that are at times frequented by children.

"This is a matter of life and death. How much are you willing to compromise? At some point you have to draw the line," Valley said.

Kitzhaber told reporters Monday that he agreed to HB2828 because it also would impose a smoking ban in all other workplaces statewide. About 65 percent of employees in Oregon already work in a smoke-free environment, and the bill would push that to about 95 percent, the governor said.

"If the objective is to reduce the number of people who are exposed to secondhand smoke, this moves us a great step in that direction," Kitzhaber said. "Vetoing the bill would take us in the opposite direction."

In 1998, Corvallis became the first city in Oregon to adopt an ordinance banning smoking in bars and taverns. Since then, Eugene, Philomath, St. Helens and other local governments have adopted similar ordinances.

The bill would keep in place the 17 local ordinances already adopted, but it would halt future efforts to ban smoking in drinking establishments. State health officials said they were aware of a dozen places, including Salem and Oregon City, where such bans were under consideration.