Council Bans Smoking on Beach

By Blair Clarkson
Staff Writer

March 24 -- With news cameras trained on the dais, the City Council on Tuesday narrowly approved an historic ordinance to ban smoking on the beach and partially restrict smoking on the pier.

The ordinance -- which comes almost a year after the Council voted to outlaw smoking in public parks -- also prohibits smoking at bus stops and other public waiting areas, within 20 feet of all exits and entrances of public buildings and creates a system to enforce the new laws.

Following impassioned public testimony and heated debate, the Council amended the original proposal, which called for a complete ban on the pier, and voted to allow smoking only in designated, fireproofed areas.

"I think it's a great step forward," said Mayor Richard Bloom. Despite misgivings about the pier amendment, Bloom voted with Mayor Pro Tem Kevin McKeown and Council members Herb Katz and Ken Genser in favor of the new ordinance.

"We know that second-hand smoke is a killer," Bloom said. "We know that cigarette butts litter our community and affect the quality of our beaches. We enact these ordinances to protect the entire population from the ill effects of smoking."

"What cinches my support," agreed Genser, "is the additional problem of pollution from cigarette butts and the chemicals that seep into the sand and water. If someone needs to smoke on the beach, they can walk a short distance to a parking lot."

On the other side of the issue, Council members Pam O'Connor and Michael Feinstein argued that the ordinance encroached dangerously on personal freedoms. Council member Bob Holbrook was not present for the decision.

"I think we're going too far," said Feinstein. "I'm very uncomfortable enforcing my personal preferences on other people."

"Banning smoking on the beach, which is a large open space, is not the way to go," added O'Connor. "It's an infringement of civil liberties. Until we as a society ban tobacco outright, people are still allowed to smoke."

The council's vote came four months after directing staff to review the existing smoking regulations and return with an ordinance banning smoking on the beach and pier.

During that time, the Recreation and Parks Commission voted to support such an ordinance, but the Pier Restoration Corporation, advocated for a limited ban allowing smoking in certain designated areas of the pier.

The PRC worried that a complete ban would hurt businesses, which cater to a large number of tourists and foreign visitors who smoke.

"We need to provide a viable option to those who do smoke that does not require them to leave the pier entirely," said PRC executive director Ben Franz-Knight.

"Establishing designated smoking areas ensures the pier maintains this balance and fairly serves the millions of people who visit from around the world," he said.

"Tourism is one of the cornerstones of the economic life of the region," added PRC chair Jean McNeil Wyner. "I think it is responsible to respect our visitors and business people."

Despite the objections of the PRC and a handful of business owners who spoke out against a complete ban on the pier, the vast majority of public discussion Tuesday night came from residents, health officials and anti-smoking advocates supporting the ordinance.

"Some people who would never dream of dumping garbage in a public place throw cigarette litter on the ground without a second thought," said Robert Berger of Communities Organized Against Smoking and its Trash (COAST). "They are causing a major litter problem on the beach and a proven fire risk on our pier."

Berger, who in February urged the PRC to support the complete ban, implored the Council to approve the proposed ordinance.

"Different policies for the beach and pier don't make sense," he said. "Smokers will continue to recklessly dispose of their butts and pier fires will continue.

“Smokers talk about their right to smoke,” Berger said, “but they don't have the right to harm our precious environment and the 85 percent of the population that doesn't smoke."

Joining in the call for a complete ban were representatives from the American Lung Association, American Heart Association, American Cancer Society, Rec and Parks Commission, Malibu Surfrider Foundation and assorted advocacy groups.

"We do not want to have to run away from cancer causing smoke on the beach," said Surfrider chair Allan Reed. "The people who are polluting the air are the ones who should have to adapt."

LA City Councilman Jack Weiss also spoke out, promoting his own efforts to declare LA City's four beaches smoke-free and his desire "to start changing people's attitudes about where it is socially acceptable to smoke."

Indeed, the issue of where smoking is socially acceptable dominated the rancorous debate that followed. The decidedly fractured Council disagreed on the true fire risks to the pier, the nature of the issue, and whether or not beach and pier visitors represented "captive" audiences.

"It really is very windy at the beach and on the pier most of the time," Feinstein said. "I'm not sure that we're really captives because of the amount of wind and space and the fact that people are mobile. I would rather see us legislate in outdoor dining areas where people are captive."

"I am not as concerned about fires on the pier itself," countered Katz, "but it is a confined, captive area. For that reason I think the pier should be considered just like the beach."

O'Connor maintained her stance against the ban, viewing it as an affront to civil liberties.

"There are health aspects in a lot of activities," she said, noting that those concerned about cigarette pollution likely all drove exhaust-spilling cars to work. "Are we going to start banning high-calorie foods taken to the beach?"

"We don't seem to have a problem with second-hand donuts," responded McKeown, "we have a problem with second-hand smoke. It's not a civil liberty issue, it's a health issue."

"It's about the effect of being nearby somebody who is smoking," he continued. There are people right now who can't enjoy our pier because of the smoke."

Despite supporting the beach ban, Council member Genser expressed doubts about a complete restriction on the pier, which unlike the existing restaurant ban could require smokers at certain pier businesses to walk as far as half a mile to exit the pier and have a cigarette.

"I think that it's going to reduce the amount of voluntary compliance and is
potentially harmful to those businesses," he said. "I think it would be far better to have some smoking areas that are away from the crowds in locations where people won't experience second-hand smoke, and which confine the danger of fire."

As a result of Holbrook's absence, the Council deadlocked 3 to 3 on the original motion to ban smoking on the beach and pier. Subsequently, Genser proposed amending the ordinance to include designated smoking areas on the wooden structure and joined Bloom, McKeown and Katz in support of the new measure.

The decision, although slightly less encompassing than originally proposed, was still met with resounding applause from the tense audience in the packed council chamber.

The modified ordinance requires City staff to return with recommendations on the location and design of the designated smoking areas, and mandates an initial period during which violators would be warned rather than cited if they extinguish their cigarette.

The designated smoking areas on the pier would be similar to those on Stearns Wharf in Santa Barbara.

Despite voting for the new ordinance, Mayor Bloom disagreed with the limited restriction on the pier and compared the issue to last year's smoking ban in parks.

"I think it sends the wrong message," he said. "If there's an issue, as there is, of second-hand smoke and pollution in our parks, it's no different on the beach, and it's no different on the pier. It's just a different location. People are not captive in our parks.

"We enact these ordinances for the 85 percent of the population who don't smoke and who shouldn't have to move away from a smoker."