Topeka, KS.  Feb. 3, 2010:   A competing smoke free bill introduced in the Kansas House of Representatives today has public health advocates howling in protest. “Our primary concern with the new bill is that it overrides the 36 local smoke free ordinances approved by Kansas communities over the past ten years,” said Jake Lowen of Clean Air Kansas.  Lowen said it was completely hypocritical for those legislators who have been arguing for years that they are champions of local control, to include a preemption clause that states no local ordinance can be stronger than the state law. “House Bill 2642 undoes a decade of good public policy on the local level in Kansas,” Lowen said. “This bill is the tobacco industry’s dream bill.” 
 

The latest bill introduced in the Kansas House, if approved, would allow smoking to return to all bars, clubs, casinos, and food service establishments with ventilated rooms, smoking and non smoking sections, and hospitality establishments that pay a fee to allow smoking. It also would undo voter approved smoke free ordinances in Emporia and Manhattan.  “We believe HB 2642 is a bad bill because everyone deserves the right to breathe clean air no matter where they work,” Lowen said. “The fee or licensing provision allows businesses to buy their way out of protecting their employees and the public from second hand smoke.” 

HB 2642 has been offered as a “compromise” bill to HB 2221, the House version of a bill approved by the Kansas Senate in 2009.  “The smoke free bill previously approved twice by the Senate and sent over to the House is a compromise bill, said Lowen. “The only thing this new bill compromises is public health.” 

Public health advocates are pushing for a bill that includes restaurants and bars and sets a floor of basic protections from second hand smoke for a majority of Kansans. Clean Air Kansas is part of a coalition of health related organizations in Kansas in support of a smoke free state.

For now, Kansas remains as one of the twelve states known as “The Dirty Dozen”, without public smoking restrictions.