City says butt out

Posted Feb 9, 2012 By Laura Mueller

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EMC news -Smokers should butt out on restaurant patios as well as city-owned parks, beaches, buildings and markets, the city's public health board is recommending.

A decade after the city banned smoking indoors, the next phase of the bylaw expansion would make all city properties -including beaches, more than 1,000 parks and 300 city facilities, including the Byward and Parkdale market stalls -smoke-free zones. Smoking on city streets and sidewalks would still be allowed.

More controversial will be the push to keep smoking out of restaurant and pub patios.

But the policy got resounding support from around 20 delegates who presented at a Feb. 7 meeting that resulted in the health board endorsing the plan.

"Who would have thought you'd be here to tell us we're foot dragging and not moving fast enough ... we thought we were being cutting edge," said Somerset Coun. Diane Holmes, who chairs the board.

Other municipalities have done "bits and pieces" of what Ottawa is proposing, said the city's medical officer of health, Dr. Isra Levy, but he added: "We believe the comprehensiveness of what's being done here puts Ottawa back on top."

The popularity of voluntary smoke-free signs in parks is growing, and the proposed bylaw expansion reflects that public desire for more smoke-free spaces, Holmes said.

Ottawa public health has been consulting residents and businesses on the plan for the past year.

"It's clear that people want this," Holmes said.

Smokers were included in the consultation, and they generally supported the recommendation, although in smaller numbers than the general population, Levy said.

"We're seeing a respect for non-smokers," he said.

The expanded bylaw will be discussed by the community and protective services committee on Feb. 15 and would need council's final approval on Feb. 22.

The health board added a component to the plan by asking the city health board to write to local MPs and MPPs advocating changes to the Smoke-Free Ontario Act to include water pipes or hookahs in the scope of smoking products the city can regulate.

Fines of $305 could be handed out to people smoking in restricted areas after July 2, with a warning period from April 2 to July 2.

The expanded bylaw won't require any additional funds to enforce, according to the report.

A couple of presenters at the Feb. 7 health board meeting questioned whether the expanded bylaw could be effectively enforced without more money. Glebe resident Catherine Caule said she worried the smoke-free bylaw expansion would "cannibalize" resources from other bylaw programs such as noise enforcement.

Ottawa public health staff told the board that education and a proactive approach would boost compliance with the new bylaw, but bylaw officers would also respond to complaints through 311.

OVER REGULATING?

At least one councillor, Kanata South's Allan Hubley, questioned whether it was necessary to regulate smoking outdoors at private businesses.

"Nobody disputes the importance of addressing secondhand smoke," Hubley said in an interview. "But we don't want to over-regulate these things."

Hubley, a former smoker, said he is "dead set against cigarettes."

"But I am also someone who values our rights and freedoms," he added.

If businesses know they can attract more customers and make more money by banning smoking, they will do that on their own, Hubley said.

That's the case with some of the patios in the Byward Market, the city's entertainment district with the highest concentration of patios, with more than 40 patios within its boundaries.

Jasna Jennings, executive director of the business improvement area that represents local restaurateurs and merchants, said the expanded non-smoking bylaw seems to be a non-issue for many Byward businesses.

"A lot of people felt this was a natural progression," Jennings said.

While a couple of owners worried the expanded bylaw might impact their business, there was very little turnout for consultations or opposition to the proposal, Jennings said.

"I was a little bit surprised with the lack of input," she said.

Another idea could be to add an extra licence fee for patios that want to have smoking, so there is a financial incentive to go non-smoking, Hubley said.

Only 15 per cent of Ottawans are smokers, according to the report, so it would make more financial sense for restaurants to appeal to the 85 per cent of residents who don't smoke by making their patios smoke-free. But that choice should probably be left up to the restaurants, Hubley said, although he is awaiting for more information on the level of consultation with businesses before he decides whether he'll support the proposal.


laura.mueller@metroland.com






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