Below is a listing of the latest news on legislative issues and anti-smoking movements affecting your personal freedom and rights to enjoy cigars. Get Involved, Learn about the Issues, and Take Action!
Monica Yant Kinney: Casinos and regulators blind to smoking rules
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| May 12th, 2010, 02:11 PM | Pennsylvania |
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A couple walk into Parx Casino on a Friday night. They ask the uniformed greeter where to find the nonsmoking section. His name is Frank, but his answer is vague.
"Walk toward the green carpet in the middle," Frank says, adding that he's not entirely sure himself. "We don't have signs. We just tell people where to go."
So off Robb and Gloria Tuckey walk, with me trailing behind. We hike through a sea of smoke to the island oasis to find . . . even more smoke. Throat-drying, eye-watering smoke. Oddly, much of it coming from folks oblivious to the dime-size no-smoking symbols on the slot machines devouring their cash.
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Pennsylvania Governor Proposes Cigar Tax, Again
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| May 3rd, 2010, 02:11 PM | Pennsylvania |
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A Philadelphia City Council hearing on legislation that would impose a new excise tax on smokeless tobacco products, cigars, and other tobacco-related products, originally scheduled for today, has been postponed.
The proposal to impose a local excise tax on smokeless and other tobacco products was introduced by Councilman Darrell Clarke in April, at the same time that support for Mayor Nutter’s soda tax and trash fee proposals began deteriorating. Clarke’s bill would tax cigars at 3.6 cents per ounce and would tax smokeless and pipe tobacco at a rate of 36 cents per ounce. This measure is an ineffective and misguided approach to addressing the serious fiscal challenges facing what is already the most highly taxed city in the U.S.
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Philadelphia City Council Hearing on Tobacco Tax Hike Postponed
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| May 3rd, 2010, 02:11 PM | Pennsylvania |
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A Philadelphia City Council hearing on legislation that would impose a new excise tax on smokeless tobacco products, cigars, and other tobacco-related products, originally scheduled for today, has been postponed.
The proposal to impose a local excise tax on smokeless and other tobacco products was introduced by Councilman Darrell Clarke in April, at the same time that support for Mayor Nutter’s soda tax and trash fee proposals began deteriorating. Clarke’s bill would tax cigars at 3.6 cents per ounce and would tax smokeless and pipe tobacco at a rate of 36 cents per ounce.
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Pennsylvania Governor Proposes Cigar Tax, Again
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| February 23rd, 2010, 01:11 PM | Pennsylvania |
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Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell, for the second time in as many years, is proposing a first-ever tax on premium handmade cigars for the Keystone State.
Included in Rendell's $29 billion budget for the 2010-11 fiscal year is a 30 percent levy on cigars and Other Tobacco Products (OTP) like smoking tobacco and smokeless tobacco.
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Board at odds over smoking ban
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| June 9th, 2009, 09:13 AM | Pennsylvania |
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JUN 9 - Last month it seemed as though the township's parks and recreation committee was leaning toward a total smoking ban in township parks, but now it seems as though the Upper Moreland commissioners have had a change of heart.
“Last time we talked about this the only feedback I had received was for a total ban,” Commissioner Kevin Spearing said at a meeting May 26. “But now, after hearing from more people, I think smoking should be allowed in designated areas of the parks.”
The ban, first addressed by the township's parks and recreation advisory council several months ago, hopes to cut down on litter, reduce health hazards and promote a healthier image. The township is not the first to look into a smoking ban. Upper Dublin Township already has one in place.
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Mention of smoking ban fires up golfers
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| June 7th, 2009, 07:52 AM | Pennsylvania |
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JUN 7 - Bethel Park's Joe Sedon Jr. was sitting on a bench at South Park Golf Course, enjoying the last couple puffs on a cigarette before he played.
When Sedon heard that there is a movement in some cities to ban smoking at public golf courses, he was quick to respond.
"Are you kidding?" the Vietnam War veteran said. "I dodged bullets in a rice pad and got spat at when I got home, but at least I could smoke. Now, some government officials want to ban smoking in the outdoors?"
It's true. In some parts of the U.S., including Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Diego, Hawaii County, Minneapolis and Abilene, Texas, there are ordinances that prevent golfers from enjoying a smoke while on the course.
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Pa. panel rules against state schools' smoking ban
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| May 27th, 2009, 07:41 AM | Pennsylvania |
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HARRISBURG (AP), MAY 27 — Pennsylvania's 14 state-owned universities cannot bar faculty members and coaches from smoking outdoors on campus, unless their unions agree to the restriction, a state labor panel ruled.
The ban in question was imposed by the State System of Higher Education in September, when a state law banning most indoor smoking took effect. System Chancellor John Cavanaugh said he interpreted the smoking law to extend to all campus grounds, because some classes are held outside.
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Pa. Supreme Court hears police tobacco ban lawsuit
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| March 2nd, 2009, 01:07 PM | Pennsylvania |
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PITTSBURGH, MAR 2 —A state ban on smoking in most workplaces has taken much of the fire—but not the smokeless tobacco—out of a long-simmering dispute between a western Pennsylvania municipality and its police.
Attorneys for Ellwood City, its police union, and the Pennsylvania Labor Relations board argued before the Pennsylvania Supreme Court on Monday about whether Ellwood City has a right to ban tobacco use on borough property, including by its officers working in the police station and patrol cars.
The high court heard the arguments because the police union appealed the Commonwealth Court's 5-2 decision early last year overruling the Pennsylvania Labor Relations Board. The PLRB had found that Ellwood City committed an unfair labor practice when it subjected police to the August 2006 tobacco ban without submitting the issue to collective bargaining.
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Debate over cigar tax smoldering in Pennsylvania
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| February 18th, 2009, 11:01 AM | Pennsylvania |
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PITTSBURGH, FEB 18 — Given the state's sinking revenue returns, makers and sellers of cigars worry this will be the year that the Legislature and the governor are finally able to win passage of a new tax on cigars and smokeless tobacco.
Foes of tobacco usage have the opposite concern — that the tax will again be sandbagged.
Cigars, snuff, pipe filler and other types of loose tobacco are subject to an excise tax in every other state, including tobacco strongholds North Carolina and Kentucky. But in Pennsylvania, attempts to place a "sin" tax on cigars and loose tobacco have been thwarted time and again by cigar-loving politicians, wholesale retailers, snuff manufacturers, convenience store lobbyists and a small but oddly powerful bloc of tobacco farmers from Pennsylvania's midsection.
Democratic Gov. Ed Rendell proposed a snuff and cigar tax in 2007, and the proposal was defeated. His Republican predecessor, Gov. Mark Schweiker, proposed the same with the same results.
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Pennsylvania rethinks smoking ban in hotel bars after lawsuits are threatened
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| February 16th, 2009, 06:01 PM | Pennsylvania |
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FEB 16 - Health officials may relax the state's new ban on indoor smoking in response to lawyers' complaints about rules against lighting up in hotel bars.
Judy Ochs, director of the state Health Department's Division of Tobacco Prevention and Control, said the department is doing a legal review after attorneys for about a dozen hotels called to challenge the ban.
Trey Matheu, general manager of a western Pennsylvania resort that now prohibits smoking in its cigar bar because of the new law, said he hopes the state will relent without a protracted court battle.
''We'd like them to take a second look at the legislation,'' Matheu said.
The law went into effect in September 2008, banning smoking inside most public buildings and businesses. Some businesses, including many freestanding bars, were allowed to apply for exemptions.
Hotels could apply to let people continue smoking in some rooms. Hotel bars weren't explicitly covered by the legislation, and Ochs said the Health Department now is trying to figure out what to do with them.
So far, she said, more than 300 hotels with liquor licenses have applied to have their bars exempt. The state denied more than 200 of those requests, and still is deciding on some.
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Tobacco companies oppose proposed state taxes
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| February 11th, 2009, 11:26 AM | Pennsylvania |
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HARRISBURG, FEB 11 -- To Gov. Ed Rendell, increasing the state's tax on cigarettes and imposing new taxes on cigars and smokeless tobacco is a "no-brainer" way to bring in needed revenue.
But officials of tobacco companies opened a counterattack today, urging legislators to say "no way" to the governor's plan to generate an additional $100 million or so for the deficit-ridden state treasury.
In a Senate Finance Committee hearing, Gary McGuirk Jr., the third-generation owner of Liberty USA of West Mifflin, which sells cigarettes and other products to 1,000 convenience stores in the state, said the new taxes would create "a perfect storm" of damage to his and other companies.
The state's new ban on indoor smoking, the new "firesafe" cigarettes, which he said hurts the taste (and sales) of cigarettes, and a large increase in federal excise taxes coming in April would combine with the new Rendell tobacco taxes to hurt his profits.
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Governor Rendell proposes state's first-ever cigar tax
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| February 4th, 2009, 12:58 PM | Pennsylvania |
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February 4, 2009
To the People of Pennsylvania:
...Pursuant to Article VIII, Section 12 of the Constitution of Pennsylvania, and Section 613 of the Administrative Code of 1929 (71 P.S. Section 233), I am transmitting to your representatives in the General Assembly my proposed budget for Fiscal Year 2009-10.
Sincerely,
Edward G. Rendell
Commonwealth of Pennsylvania
Office of the Governor, Harrisburg
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Page 32 of Governor Rendell's Budget in Brief states:
Pennsylvania’s Tax Structure - Levying a tax on other tobacco products. Pennsylvania remains the only state in the nation that does not tax tobacco products such as smokeless tobacco and cigars. The 2009-10 budget would eliminate that anomaly.
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Tougher smoking law sought
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| January 3rd, 2009, 06:28 PM | Pennsylvania |
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JAN 3 - Just months after a public smoking ban took effect in Pennsylvania, a ranking senator has launched an effort to make it even tougher.
Senate Judiciary Chairman Stewart Greenleaf, R-Montgomery, an author of the law that took effect Sept. 11, has announced plans to push a bill early next year to eliminate several exemptions in the current law.
The current law forces most indoor businesses to be smoke-free, but allows exceptions for bars with little food sales, private clubs, outdoor restaurant decks, and parts of casino floors, residential-care homes and full-service truck stops.
Greenleaf's new bill would end those exceptions, and allow any local government to enact smoke-free ordinances that are tougher than state law.
Greenleaf, in a news release, said the exceptions should be eliminated because there is no safe level of second-hand smoke, and the exceptions have created confusion that makes it harder to implement the current law, which is dubbed the Clean Indoor Air Act.
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