The Atlantic City City Council introduced a measure to ban smoking in local workplaces at its meeting last Wednesday night. The measure passed 9-0.

It's designed to close a loophole in state anti-smoking legislation that took effect in April. The law banned smoking in most workplaces, but exemptions allowed smoking to continue in tobacconists, cigar bars and on the resort's casino floors.

Casino workers, people from smokefreecasinos.com, health and anti-smoking groups and the American Heart Association supported the ban at the meeting. The people who waved banners and fans supporting council's move applauded Councilmen Bruce Ward and Gene Robinson, the ordinance's main proponents, as they spoke.

The law provides four exceptions:
1. Private homes, except when used as a daycare or other healthcare facility.
2. Designated hotel smoking rooms. But they cannot be more than 20 percent of the total rooms and must be contiguous.
3. Nursing home rooms where all residents are smokers and have made a written request to allow smoking. The smoke cannot contaminate other rooms.
4. Private clubs with no employees, except when used by the general public. The exemption does not apply to clubs that are created to get around this law.

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"Coffee is for closers." -- Glengarry GlenRoss

It will be interesting to see how this impacts the casino business.

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Luck be a Lady

I bet there will be a lot more irate customers and confrontations at the poker tables. Lots of gamblers needing a smoke.

Interesting point. I never thought about that.

Seems like it would cause a lot of players to step away from the table for a smoke and disrupt the flow of lots of games. Then again, the casino may look as flustered smokers gambling as a good thing.

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Luck be a Lady

I think it's a shame that the political situation in this country has gotten so bad that people are willing to accept these kinds of paternalistic decisions.

You hit the nail right on the head, Lewis. But what can we do about it, other than vote them out of office and write them letters?

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"Coffee is for closers." -- Glengarry GlenRoss

Looks like the ban may start as early as January or February.

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Luck be a Lady

On the eve of a City Council vote to ban smoking in casinos, a compromise measure is making the rounds that would still allow gamblers to light up — albeit on a limited basis.
The new ordinance would allow smoking on 25 percent of a casino's gaming floor, with the smoking sections enclosed and separately ventilated from the rest of the building.

“I have an understanding that we owe the casino industry some kind of a compromise instead of banning (smoking) completely,” said Councilman Dennis Mason, who sponsored the measure after about four weeks of negotiations with the Casino Association of New Jersey, a trade group representing the resort's 11 casinos. “I think this is fair.”

The ordinance counters the original measure, which was designed to close a loophole in 2006 state antismoking legislation that specifically exempted casino gaming floors. Both ordinances are scheduled for a vote during Wednesday's City Council meeting.

But Councilman Bruce Ward, who proposed the full ban, maintained that he and fellow ban proponent Councilman Gene Robinson will not waiver from their stance to ban casino smoking outright.

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"Coffee is for closers." -- Glengarry GlenRoss

See, here's my problem with smoking bans. Casinos are not public places. They are privately owned businesses. As such, the person who owns the business should be able to decide whether or not to allow smoking in his establishment. If non-smoking customers are offended by the smoke, then they shouldn't patronize the business. If they generate demand for non-smoking sections or entire non-smoking casinos, then casino owners will meet that need in order to capitalize on that niche.

I have no problem with the government saying I can't smoke in the public library. But they have no right to tell a business that they can't allow a perfectly legal activity.

TRENTON, N.J. -- A group lobbying to extend New Jersey's indoor smoking ban to Atlantic City casinos released a study Monday showing continued high levels of smoke pollution in nonsmoking areas at gambling establishments with designated smoking sections.

The study of Rhode Island video gambling facilities, where state law requires separately walled and ventilated sections _ as does an initially approved Atlantic City ordinance _ produced expected results: the more concentrated the smoking section, the higher the level of air pollution.

However, the study also showed that the nonsmoking sections in Rhode Island gambling establishments were far from smoke-free. In one facility, the nonsmoking area ranged from 17 percent to 37 percent as polluted as the smoking section. In the other, the nonsmoking area was 39 percent as polluted as the smoking section, according to the study.

"How dismal that the separately walled and ventilated nonsmoking sections are still one-third as polluted as the extra-polluted smoking sections," said Regina Carlson, executive director of New Jersey Group Against Smoking Pollution, or GASP.

Repeated calls to the Casino Association of New Jersey were not returned Monday.

According to New Jersey GASP, it's estimated that confining smoking in Atlantic City casinos to a quarter of the gaming area could produce pollution levels as high as four times the levels in currently undivided casinos.

For an employee who worked in that area full-time, his or her exposure would be five times the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency annual limit. Currently, casino employee exposure to cigarette smoke exceeds the EPA limit by a factor of more than one and a half, the group said.

"For employees and patrons in any of these smoking areas, quite simply, the air is not fit to breathe," Carlson said. "The only way to protect employees and patrons is to make casinos smoke-free."

Under a compromise agreement that won initial approval from the Atlantic City Council last month, the casinos would set up separate enclosures on a quarter of their floor space, with floor-to ceiling walls and high-powered ventilation systems to suck smoke out of the air.

At least some of the casinos are considering making their smoking areas lounges for patrons who wish to smoke, while keeping gambling tables in smoke-free areas. But others are toying with the idea of putting some of their highest income-generating table games in smoking areas, reasoning that many of their high-rollers are smokers.

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Vegas, Baby, Vegas!