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Major fight over cigar-store smoking in Danvers:
Cigar smoking, indoors and out, has become a cause celebre in Danvers, Massachusetts (population: 25,212).
The Danvers Herald reported that Cigars R Us owner Frank Ciampa submitted a request for an exception to the local Board of Healths strict anti-smoking policy which does not allow smoking in tobacco shops. The Boards law is stricter than the state law, which has an exception for retail tobacconists.
Naturally, the anti-smoking forces in the town are against the variance, but the head of the Danvers Downtown Improvement Committee, C.R. Lyons, sent a letter requesting the variance by approved so that smoking within the store was permitted. However, at the same time, Lyons would require that the benches outside the store be removed so that smoking does not take place outside the store.
The outdoor smoking, currently permitted by law, has offended enough people that a petition, signed by 13 people, to ban smoking within 25 feet of entrances to buildings, will be submitted to the Town Meeting in May. Petitions must have ten signatures to qualify for presentation.
Such a petition has little possibility of passage, since the Board of Health cannot provide enforcement for areas it does not issue permits for. And as yet, it does not issue permits for outdoor areas.
The issue is a microcosm of the intolerance toward smoking which is being promoted by anti-tobacco task forces and, to a smaller extent, by intolerant members of the public. What happens in Danvers is worth paying attention to.
Cigar smoking, indoors and out, has become a cause celebre in Danvers, Massachusetts (population: 25,212).
The Danvers Herald reported that Cigars R Us owner Frank Ciampa submitted a request for an exception to the local Board of Healths strict anti-smoking policy which does not allow smoking in tobacco shops. The Boards law is stricter than the state law, which has an exception for retail tobacconists.
Naturally, the anti-smoking forces in the town are against the variance, but the head of the Danvers Downtown Improvement Committee, C.R. Lyons, sent a letter requesting the variance by approved so that smoking within the store was permitted. However, at the same time, Lyons would require that the benches outside the store be removed so that smoking does not take place outside the store.
The outdoor smoking, currently permitted by law, has offended enough people that a petition, signed by 13 people, to ban smoking within 25 feet of entrances to buildings, will be submitted to the Town Meeting in May. Petitions must have ten signatures to qualify for presentation.
Such a petition has little possibility of passage, since the Board of Health cannot provide enforcement for areas it does not issue permits for. And as yet, it does not issue permits for outdoor areas.
The issue is a microcosm of the intolerance toward smoking which is being promoted by anti-tobacco task forces and, to a smaller extent, by intolerant members of the public. What happens in Danvers is worth paying attention to.
