Lockheed Fire smoke considered

The Lockheed Fire as seen from Swift Street and Highway One
Photo courtesy of Rob Knight

Can we justify our persecution of tobacco smokers by claiming justification as a health hazard?

By Becky Johnson
August 7, 2011

Santa Cruz, Ca. -- On October 8th, 2009, the City of Santa Cruz' 'Smoking Pollution Control ordinance' went into effect. Pushed by Vice-Mayor Ryan Coonerty and City Councilmember, Don Lane, the ban outlawed smoking in wide swaths of public and private property throughout the City. The reasons given were for health reasons and because of tobacco litter.

While smoking tobacco and marijuana were explicitly banned, not all forms of air pollution were addressed. In fact, most weren't.

Air pollution in the City of Santa Cruz contains the smoke produced from automobiles, trucks, refrigeration units, industry, home gas heaters, cooking fumes from homes and restaurants, smoke from backyard barbeques, fireplaces, woodstoves, particle burners, candles, incense, outgassing from particle board, new carpeting, paints, lacquers, air fresheners, hairspray, cleaning fluids as well as dust kicked up in the wind. And what about that gas vapor we smell as we fill our gas tanks? In California alone, this totals 15,811 gallons a day or roughly the equivalence of two tanker truckfulls.

The average car driven in Santa Cruz produces 0.849 lbs of carbon emissions per average US passenger vehicle mile driven. Compared to a pack of cigarettes, this is the equivalent air pollution of 13.6 packs of cigarettes per mile. All of this exhaust goes into our atmosphere where everyone breathes it.

Yet only the smoke from individuals burning small amounts of tobacco or cannabis for personal use have been criminalized.

Consider this: The Lockheed fire burned 7,817 acres between Aug 12 - Aug 23 2009 in N. Santa Cruz County. It's origin has been shrouded in mystery but many believe that law enforcement accidentally started it by trying to burn down a remote marijuana garden. The irony of this cannot be overstated.

Mostly forested lands in the Swanton and Big Creek watershed burned. For 11 days smoke filled the county, choking residents and making everyone miserable. According to the EPA standard, (average fuel loading for woodland fires in California) the Lockheed fire generated 18 tons per acre of air pollution.

140,706 TONS of particulate matter were lofted into the sky and various dilutions of smoke drifted the northern half of the county for 11 days, affecting people out of doors and indoors as well.

The City of Santa Cruz has 60,000 people.

Let's say that 20% of them smoke. Let's say they smoke 1 pack a day.

1 pack a day = 30.5 per month = 366 packs per YEAR
366 packs of cigarettes = 22.87 lbs.

So one smoker in one year produces a potential of 22.87 lbs of air pollution. 12,000 smokers in Santa Cruz for 1 year produce a maximum of 274440 lbs or 137.22 tons per year.

Our citizenry were miserable for days by being exposed to the smoke from that ONE fire. Maybe some asthmatics died then. I don't know. But in order to produce the same amount of air pollution the Lockheed fire produced, all the tobacco smokers in the City of Santa Cruz would have to smoke for 1,025 YEARS.

And this was just the smoke from ONE fire.

No, the Santa Cruz Smoking Ban is not about protection from a 'health hazard' or because of tobacco littering. A public education campaign would take care of that. The ban is about banning people who smoke cigarettes from areas where shoppers and tourists congregate. And its about banning poor and homeless people, since police can pick and choose who they decide to issue a citation to. I'd bet dollars to donuts that more poor and homeless people have been warned and cited than tourists or shoppers.

NYC Smoking Ban is Civic Disservice

Times Square, New York City, one of 1,700 parks and plazas
where smoking will be banned under a new City ordinance.

Commentary

By Evan Mantyk
Epoch Times Staff
Feb 7, 2011

Do you want someone next to you in the park smoking, or do you want someone next to you in the park smoking and casting nervous glances at you- hoping that you don’t threaten to report them to the police?

That is the reality behind the city’s impending ban on smoking in public areas like parks, beaches, and public plazas, including the large one in Times Square. The law is considered one of, if not the widest reaching smoking ban in the country. But you can expect no new police staff will be added to enforce it.

Councilwoman Gale Brewer, the bill's main sponsor, said that she anticipates the ban will mostly be self-enforced by New Yorkers, according to the Associated Press. Basically, one New Yorker lights up in a park, the next one is irritated by the smoking and says: “I’m going to report you to the police.” The smoking New Yorker is then scared into putting the cigarette out or leaving the park.

Certainly less smoking or no smoking is good for New Yorkers’ health; but think about it— what kind of New Yorker reports a fellow New Yorker for smoking a cigarette outside in the open air? Not one I would want to be around.

And this could just be the beginning. The City University of New York is planning to ban smoking on all of its campuses next year.

These bans do not seem like a move to truly improve the quality of life in our city, like the ban on smoking in restaurants and bars in 2003, but rather like an antiquated, big brother-ish move by city officials hoping to impress themselves and others with what they have accomplished.

Smokers enjoy cigarettes on
a New York City balcony,
an activity that is now banned
under the new ordinance.

I am a non-smoking political independent. The unfortunate reality is that politicians survive off of laws and bills and coming up with new and ostensibly better ways to govern. The truly great politician will be the one who is willing to once in a while approach governing from the perspective of reducing laws and appealing to a higher power, whether that be public awareness, capitalist forces, fate, faith, or (if you prefer a smoking theme) the inextinguishable flame of integrity that lights the human spirit.

In this case the issue behind the law being created is second hand smoke

“By voting to prohibit smoking in all 1,700 City parks and 14 miles of beaches, the City Council will help us protect more New Yorkers from the harmful effects of second-hand smoke – particularly children who suffer from asthma,” said Mayor Michael Bloomberg in a statement.

“The statistics don’t lie: second hand smoke kills. With this bill, all New Yorkers can now breathe easier and breathe cleaner air,” said Council Speaker Christine Quinn.

But, instead of creating more laws to reduce the chance of second hand smoke in public areas, why not focus on creating more public area for New Yorkers, smokers and non-smokers alike. It actually wouldn’t be that hard at all since large portions of park space in the city are often closed off from the public.

Most of my trips to Madison Square Park with my wife and two kids have been filled with comments on what a complete waste the usually fenced off lawn area is. Sure, the grass is well kept and pristinely green, but most of the time it is off limits to the public.

The closed off grass is like our city lawmakers, trying to look so perfect but really just doing this city a disservice.

Evan Mantyk can be reached at evan.mantyk@epochtimes.com

In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107 and The Berne Convention on Literary and Artistic Works, Article 10, the news clippings, audio, and images used in this posting are made available without profit for research and educational purposes.

Prohibitionist Mentality at Santa Cruz City Council

Photo: Citizen Fitmaurice attends the 2oth anniversary remembrance of the October 17th, 1989 Earthquake in front of the Santa Cruz Post Office. Fitzmaurice was on the council in 2000 when the original medical marijuana dispensary ordinance was written. Photo by Becky Johnson

by Becky Johnson
January 31, 2010

Santa Cruz, CA. -- What's up with "marijuana-friendly" Santa Cruz? Five years after Prop 215 passed, the Santa Cruz City Council passed an ordinance to regulate dispensaries. Five years AFTER passage, and TEN YEARS after passage of Prop 215, the first dispensary, Greenway, opened. Since then, two other dispensaries have opened. One opened in the downtown area, but was shut down by the City in less than a month. The second, opened with permits and is still in operation. That's two dispensaries, and both are doing a brisk business. In cash-strapped Santa Cruz, many have thought of regulating and taxing marijuana as a way to boost sagging budgets. But few who are thinking along those lines actually hold a seat on the City Council.

And this, despite clear indications in February by the Justice Department, that the DEA would no longer enforce marijuana eradication efforts in States which have legalized such activities. On October 19, 2010, Attorney General Eric Holder put it in writing. So why the delay?

The Santa Cruz Sentinel published news of the desire to extend a moratorium on new dispensaries by the planning department in an article by J.M. Brown entitled "Santa Cruz medical marijuana advocate urges city to rule on plan for new dispensary" on January 31, 2010 tells the tale of Stuart Kriege who completed his application to open a medical marijuana dispensary on the West Side of Santa Cruz. After 8 years of the intractable Bush Administration leaving in its wake arrests, crop seizures, and an array of charges or just seizures, the cannabis friendlies sensed that change from the Obama Administration would result in a less prohibitionist mentality. However, that is all that applicant Kriege was experiencing.

"Despite Kriege's plea, the City Council unanimously extended the ban for four months and 15 days so planners could verify whether there was a need for additional dispensaries. A city survey found a quarter of buyers at the existing clubs live outside Santa Cruz County."

Now one can wonder at how the City managed to survey pot buyers. People are disinclined to give their home address, and the information given to the provider is confidential. And since when has the City been concerned about visitors coming from outside Santa Cruz County to our environs to buy any other product? How would City Planners determine if there was a need anyway? People again, in an atmosphere of criminalization of selected substances, are unlikely to volunteer what their future marijuana buying habits are likely to be. And haven't City Planners had enough time already? At what point does a delay become a de facto ban?

"Council members also want planners to ensure Kriege's proposed shop and the two local clubs meet state and local regulations, including operating like nonprofit organizations."

Again, this is puzzling. The ordinance written in 2000, does provide minute detail for operating a dispensary. Two centers are currently operating, presumably within State and local laws, and structured as non-profits, so why the confusion? And why do we even PAY these planners? They sound like speedbumps. Costly speedbumps.

"the City Council has to weigh expanding legal access to pot at a time of increasing anxiety about drug- and gang-related violence."

So irrational fear, driven by an anti-marijuana prohibitionist mentality reigns supreme at the leftmost City Council. Nevermind that neither dispensary currently open has had any gang associations whatsoever, and a well-run dispensary would put drug-dealing street gangs out of business and customers would vote with their feet.

"Still, city planners said they need more time to make a recommendation about expanding regulations on dispensaries. The current ban was set to expire Feb. 8. Planners first asked
for a ban last June after receiving near daily inquiries about opening pot clubs -- as interest sparked by an announcement from the Obama administration that California
dispensaries would no longer be targeted by federal drug agents. Only Kriege has
pursued a formal permit request. Several council members said they agreed to give planners more time to ensure that dispensaries don't operate at a hefty profit, given that medical marijuana is supposed to be a low-cost enterprise."

BECKY: This is the opposite of what they have actually said. They have urged operators to charge the same amount of money as black market street prices so that buyers are disinclined to sell it once they get it. Technically the dispensaries are not supposed to profit, but quite a bit of money does change hands. For budget-starved Santa Cruzans paying a very high sales tax and facing cuts in services, taxing marijuana seems a logical solution.

The ordinance doesn't say anything about the price, other than that they must provide it to anyone eligible, even if they can't afford it. (I am unaware of any other non-profit in Santa Cruz which is required to give away product!) Both dispensaries have attempted to supply grass to low-income folks including a discount and 'compassion baggies' which they give away.

"My primary concern is that our local ordinance and state law seemed to me to say a dispensary can only be a co-op or collective," Councilman Don Lane said. "Both models are democratically controlled and member-oriented."

Don is behind the times. Owners quickly re-organized their operations to fit the cooperative or collective model. Buyers show proof of their medical eligibility, and agree to a set of terms. They then join the collective, thus complying with State Law. But apparently Don needs more time to figure this out. None of the reasons proposed make the slightest sense. The dispensaries have not generated a single call for service, not surprising considering that the ordinance requires a uniformed security guard to be on the premises during hours of operation (again adding to the costs which no other business or non-profit is required to do).

I can't imaging that GREENWAY is "democratically controlled" either. Owner, Lisa Molyneaux, invested her life savings to open the doors. A buyer coming to score some bud hardly has the same say about how it is run. Perhaps DON LANE just doesn't like smokers, no matter their brand. In September, the council, led by LANE passed a sweeping anti-smoking ban that criminalized burning any combustible substance.

READ ENTIRE ARTICLE HERE: http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/localnews/ci_14304899

Poor Science by the CDC and HHS on Second Hand Smoke

Man openly defies the smoking ban on Pacific Ave.
January 10, 2010 -photo by Becky Johnson

Editors Note: On June 16th of 2009, Laurie Lang testified before the ad hoc Outdoor Smoking Task Force headed by Santa Cruz City Councilmembers Ryan Coonerty, Mike Rotkin, and Don Lane, As the representative of the Santa Cruz County Department of Health she made the following claim:

"There are hidden costs to smoking. Three years after Pueblo, CO instituted its smoking ban, a 40% drop in emergency room visits for heart problems was recorded."

But is it true? That seems a very dramatic drop in emergency room visits based on banning second hand smoke in restaurants and bars? Yet, here was an expert, a paid professional health spokesman, reminicient of the flouride is good for our teeth people. Filled with their own authority and lulling the populace into thinking that solid science is behind these claims. Well, just as I suspected, it's not. But it takes a Medical doctor who has been studying the effects of tobacco on the human body for 20 years as a scientist, and is currently a professor at a university teaching social and behavioral sciences, to read the studies, look at the data, and ask what turn out to be very reasonable questions any thinking person should have asked.---Becky Johnson, Editor

"I am a physician who specialized in preventive medicine and public health. I am now a professor in the Social and Behavioral Sciences Department, Boston University School of Public Health. I have 20 years of experience in tobacco control, primarily as a researcher. My areas of research interest include the health effects of secondhand smoke, policy aspects of regulating smoking in public places, effects of cigarette marketing on youth smoking behavior, and the evaluation of tobacco control program and policy interventions."

--- Michael Siegel, Boston, Ma.

CDC: Pueblo Smoking Ban Reduced Heart Attacks by 41%, Due Mostly to Decreased Secondhand Smoke Exposure; But Conclusions are Biased and Invalid

by Dr. Michael Siegel
January 5, 2010

Published at: The Rest of the Story
Tobacco News Analysis and Study
found online at: http://tobaccoanalysis.blogspot.com/2009/01/cdc-pueblo-smoking-ban-reduced-heart.html

In a new study published in the current issue of MMWR (Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Reports), researchers from Colorado and from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have concluded that the smoking ban in Pueblo, Colorado caused a 41% reduction in heart attacks during the three years following its implementation, primarily due to a reduction in secondhand smoke exposure associated with the ban (see: Alsever RN, et al. Reduced Hospitalizations for Acute Myocardial Infarction After Implementation of a Smoke-Free Ordinance --- City of Pueblo, Colorado, 2002--2006. MMWR 2009; 57(51);1373-1377).

The study compared the rate of hospitalizations for acute myocardial infarction (heart attacks) in the city of Pueblo with similar rates in Pueblo county (outside of Pueblo) and El Paso county (which includes Colorado Springs) for the 18-month period prior to the implementation of Pueblo's smoking ban and for the two 18-month periods following the smoking ban, which was implemented in July 2003. While there was no significant reduction in heart attack admissions for Pueblo or El Paso counties, there was a reduction in the heart attack rate of 19% and 41% from pre-implementation to the first and second post-implementation periods, respectively, in the city of Pueblo.

The study concludes: "These findings suggest that smoke-free policies can result in reductions in AMI [acute myocardial infarction] hospitalizations that are sustained over a 3-year period and that these policies are important in preventing morbidity and mortality associated with heart disease. This effect likely is mediated through reduced SHS [secondhand smoke] exposure among nonsmokers and reduced smoking, with the former making the larger contribution."

The Rest of the Story

Before you jump to any conclusions here (something the study did prematurely), consider this: let's accept the study's conclusion as correct - that smoking bans do lead to a dramatic, immediate reduction in heart attacks, in part because of a large reduction in smoking prevalence. Let's suppose that you want to demonstrate this "fact" by showing that compared to a similar city, heart attack rates in the city with the smoking ban fell substantially more after the ban was implemented.

Now you have to choose a comparison city. You have two choices, with the following information available about the smoking prevalence changes in those cities from pre-implementation to post-implementation:

City A - The smoking prevalence increased from 19% to 24%.
City B - The smoking prevalence remained relatively unchanged, dropping only from 24% to 23%.

Which city would you choose as the comparison city?

If you choose city B, you would be justified. There was little change in smoking prevalence, which mirrored the changes nationally during that time period, so one could argue that this is a reasonable comparison group.

If you choose city A, where there was a large increase in smoking prevalence, you are going to expect to see an increase in heart attacks due to the rise in smoking alone. This is going to artificially reduce any secular decline in heart attacks occurring in the comparison city and bias your results towards finding a larger decline in heart attacks in the city with the smoking ban.

A researcher who chose city A as the comparison city would certainly be suspected of having intentionally biased the results towards finding an effect of the smoking ban on heart attacks.

The last thing in the world that you want for a comparison city is one in which there was actually an increase in smoking prevalence, defying all odds about what the national trends in smoking are throughout the nation.

Unfortunately, this is exactly what this study does: it knowingly uses a comparison county in which it has been documented that the smoking prevalence over the study period has increased from 17.4% to 22.3%.

The study doesn't try to hide this fact. It openly acknowledges that the reported smoking prevalence in El Paso County (the comparison group) increased from 17.4% in 2002-2003 to 22.3% in 2004-2005.

Given this finding, El Paso County simply cannot be used as a comparison population. You can't take a population in which you know that smoking prevalence increased substantially and "pretend" that it represents a reasonable area in which to evaluate the baseline secular trends in heart attack admission rates that would have occurred in the smoking ban city in the absence of the smoking ban.

Of course you are going to find that the rate of heart attacks in El Paso County did not decline all that much, given the increase in smoking. El Paso County is clearly not going to give you a good, representative picture of what the actual secular trend in heart attack admissions is.

Now if smoking rates throughout the country had increased substantially during the same time period, one could argue that El Paso county is representative of the nation as a whole, or of Colorado as a whole. But clearly, the trends in smoking reported in El Paso are an anomaly - they are very different from the rest of the nation and from Colorado, where we know that smoking has continued to decline during the study period.

While I am not arguing here that the study intentionally used El Paso county in order to try to create the finding of a smoking ban effect on heart attacks, the fact that the study failed to even consider this problem suggests to me that there is a great deal of bias inherent in the paper. Yes, I do think that the study wanted to find an effect of the smoking ban and that it lost its neutrality somewhere in the process. It's natural to want to see the positive effects of a public health policy. But you have to separate your desires from the science itself. More about that later.

Another important problem is the other comparison group that was used: the rest of Pueblo county. Since this area is directly adjacent to Pueblo, which is the one city in this area, it would be expected that many residents of Pueblo county work in, and/or spend time in Pueblo, including eating in restaurants in the city. Thus, one would expect that if the smoking ban reduced heart attack rates, it would reduce rates among Pueblo county residents as well. It's not like those residents were somehow shielded from the intervention.

For this reason, the study should have combined the heart attack admissions from Pueblo and Pueblo county. Doing this, the reduction in the heart attack rate from pre-implementation to the second post-implementation period is 33%, rather than 41%.

Two logical comparison groups that one would want to consider are the state of Colorado as a whole and the nation as a whole. Heart attack admission rates for Colorado during the approximate period of the study (2002-2005) dropped by 18.4%. For the United States as a whole, the heart attack admission rate dropped by 17.2% during this period.

It is quite a different situation to claim that the smoking ban in Pueblo reduced heart attacks by 41% (because there was no significant decline in the inappropriate comparison county of El Paso) than it is to view the whole picture, and see that a 33% decline in heart attacks in Pueblo must be compared with about an 18% drop throughout the state of Colorado and a 17% decline nationally during the same time period.

The fact that these comparisons were not made is problematic, since the data are readily available (it took me about half hour to access and run the numbers). Why wouldn't the study want to look at the statewide trends in Colorado, rather than simply rely on the biased control group of El Paso county? In 30 minutes, the study could have determined that there was an impressive 18% decline in heart attacks in the whole state during the study period, thus making it clear that the present conclusion of the study is inaccurate.

The bottom line is that the study fails to appropriately determine the baseline secular trends in heart attacks in order to be able to judge the differences observed in Pueblo from the trends that would have been expected in the absence of the smoking ban. For this reason, the study cannot conclude that the observed changes in heart attacks are due to the smoking ban, rather than to other changes that took place over time, including changes in medications being used to treat heart disease, better diagnosis and more aggressive treatment of heart disease, and a substantial decline in smoking prevalence in Pueblo county during the study period, which may or may not be due to the smoking ban itself.

More troubling to me than the fact that the study draws a conclusion that is premature and inadequately supported by the data is the appearance of bias in the study. Not only in the choice of a comparison community where smoking prevalence dramatically increased during the study period, but also in the conclusion itself.

Even if we stipulate that the smoking ban did cause the decline in heart attacks, how can the study possibly conclude that the effect was due primarily to reduced secondhand smoke exposure? The study made no attempt to determine the smoking status of the heart attack victims, so there is no evidence that the reduction in heart attacks occurred primarily among nonsmokers. Neither did the study measure changes in population-based exposure to secondhand smoke.

Moreover, the study itself documents that there was a substantial decline in smoking prevalence in Pueblo county during the study period, from 25.9% to 20.6%. Wouldn't this documented decline in active smoking prevalence be the presumed major reason for the observed decline in heart attacks, as opposed to reductions in secondhand smoke exposure? At very least, wouldn't a study simply remark that both mechanisms may be operating, but that it can't be determined to what extent each is contributing?

The fact that the study concludes that it must primarily be the secondhand smoke reduction is curious. The fact that the editorial note of the study begins by claiming that evidence shows that brief secondhand smoke exposure can trigger a heart attack is revealing. If you look at the report to which that claim refers (the 2006 Surgeon General's report), you will not find any conclusion that brief secondhand smoke exposure triggers heart attacks. And you certainly won't find any evidence in that report that if we reduce secondhand smoke exposure, we can reduce heart attacks triggered by secondhand smoke exposure.

You may remember that I have previously called attention to the poor science by CDC and the Department of Health and Human Services in their communications regarding the acute cardiovascular effects of secondhand smoke, when they went out on a limb, against the advice of respected and expert scientists in the tobacco control field, and told the public that brief secondhand smoke exposure is enough to trigger heart attacks, cause heart disease, and cause lung cancer.

It seems odd that even if we stipulate that the overall conclusion of the study is valid (that the smoking ban caused a dramatic reduction in heart attacks in Pueblo), the study would emphasize that the effect must be primarily due to the reduction in secondhand smoke and thus a reduction in heart attacks among nonsmokers that would have otherwise been triggered by brief secondhand smoke exposures in restaurants or other public places.

Even if I were writing this editorial as a highly biased advocate, I would have simply concluded that the effect is likely due to the combination of a reduction in smoking prevalence and a reduction in secondhand smoke, but that the study provides no way of teasing out the degree to which these two phemomena are operating.

In fact, given the large decline in smoking prevalence reported in Pueblo county, even the above conclusion seems biased, since it is clear that if the effect were real, the smoking prevalence reduction would likely have been a major reason.

The study goes overboard not only in its overall conclusion, but in its attempt to paint these data as somehow proving that eating in a smoky restaurant for a half hour is causing lots of people to keel over from heart attacks. The study does nothing of the sort.

Let me finish by emphasizing that I would like nothing more than to have strong evidence presented that smoking bans are resulting in immediate and dramatic reductions in heart attacks. As I have devoted much of my life's work to promoting smoking bans, especially in bars and restaurants, it would bring a great sense of fulfillment to now that these policies are immediately saving lives and that we can document these acute effects.

However, I am first a scientist and I believe that in public health, our conclusions must be based on solid science, not just on conjecture or our deeply felt desire to see the success of our policies.

The Politics of the Playground

Wednesday, 20 January 2010

by Chris Snowdon





PHOTO: Man openly violates the smoking ban
on Pacific Ave. January 10, 2010





found online at: http://velvetgloveironfist.blogspot.com/2010/01/politics-of-playground.html

Like many a political leader before him, the Mayor of Santa Cruz is learning that when it comes to tobacco, nothing you do is ever good enough to satisfy the prohibitionists.

As reported previously, Santa Cruz recently enforced an outdoor smoking ban to go along with its many other anti-smoking laws. Santa Cruz resident Ethan Epstein describes how 'comprehensive' these bans are:

In this bastion of “tolerance,” smoking has been banned throughout all indoor public spaces, outdoor dining areas, parks, beaches, and downtown thoroughfares. My (exorbitantly overpriced) apartment building has imposed a smoking ban that even covers private residences.

I don’t smoke, but my girlfriend does, and she is forced to shiver in the bitter – for California – cold when she wants to light up. That smell wafting into your apartment is not cigarette smoke: it’s illiberalism and intolerance.

And what does the American Lung Association in California (ALAC) do to reward Santa Cruz's slavish devotion to the anti-smoking cause? It awards the city a 'D' in its Tobacco Report Card.

Treating this arbitary rating system with absurd high seriousness, ALAC spokesman Paul Knepprath said the city was oh-so-close to getting a 'C'.

Paul Knepprath, vice president for advocacy and health initiatives with the American Lung Association in California, said although Santa Cruz city code identifies "smoke" as a public nuisance, the wording isn't strong enough.

Knepprath said if the code specifically referred to second-hand tobacco smoke, it would have meant an additional bonus point, which after the errors were fixed, would raise the overall grade.

"That's how close it was," he said.

In other words, Santa Cruz could have only got a 'C' if its politicians lied and said that smoking outdoors posed a health risk to nonsmokers. There is, of course, no evidence for this.

What makes all this funnier, is that the Mayor has taken the news very badly indeed and has started throwing his toys out the pram. He scribbled an angry letter to the ALAC, saying...

"This is ridiculous and, frankly, it does not motivate me to press my City Council colleagues to take further action to reduce smoking: quite the reverse."

Quite the reverse? You mean you're going to take action to increase smoking just because the ALAC hurt your feelings?

"I feel we are being abused and that the rating system is clearly a fraud and meaningless."

And Mayor Rotkin was still throwing a hissy-fit when the press caught up with him...

"Frankly, it makes me so angry I don't ever want to talk to these people again," he said in an interview.

Is this the level of school-yard politics we've be reduced to? Draconian laws being introduced to impress the bigger boys and then petulant name-calling when they don't get the pat on the head they feel they deserve?

I don't claim to be an expert on local politics in America, but aren't politicians supposed to be acting in the interests of their electorate rather than trying to to earn gold stars from out-of-town single-issue campaigners? Rotkin's reaction makes it pretty clear that climbing up a league table comes ahead of serving his electorate.

Rotkin himself is a rum fellow. He teaches 'Community Studies' at the University of California ("yes, I think I will have fries with that"). This includes an Introduction to Marxism, which I'm sure he teaches in a balanced and reasoned way, as you would expect from someone who edited The Socialist Review for ten years, describes himself as a "Marxist-Feminist" and lists his interests as...

Marxist theory, capitalist system, community power structure, institutional analysis, and affirmative action.

According to Discover the Networks:

Rotkin's ideals are outlined in his 1991 PhD thesis (entitled Class, Populism, and Progressive Politics: Santa Cruz, California 1970 - 1982), which describes his stealth strategy to implement socialism in the United States. A chapter from this thesis, titled "A Three-Part Strategy for Democratic Socialism," currently serves as an assigned reading for his "Introduction to Marxism" course.

Part one of this strategy is Grassroots Organizing, which means finding groups with grievances against society and helping them to "wrest concessions," as he phrased it in his thesis. Borrowing from Saul Alinsky's tactics, Rotkin advocates hiding his true socialist agenda from the people he helps while "preparing the ground" for subsequent stages.

I don't wish to offend the good people of Santa Cruz who have elected him as Mayor four times, but from where I'm sitting this man sounds like an asshole.

And it gets better. Mayor Rotkin - who, let's say again, has banned smoking outdoors - is a board member of the American Civil Liberties Union. Is this guy for real, or what?

It's interesting to note that Santa Cruz's recent outdoor bans were brought in to curry favour with the ALAC after getting a 'D' last year.

The city received a "D" for 2008, which partially prompted the council to pass the ban on smoking along Pacific Avenue, West Cliff Drive, the Santa Cruz Municipal Wharf and other public sites. The ordinance, which took effect in October, expanded earlier prohibitions against smoking in restaurants and in lines for movies and concerts.

All of which makes last year's debate over whether or not to bring in these bans look like a bit of a charade. Policy seems to be being dictated by unelected pressure groups rather than the council. The silver lining is that the ALAC seem to have gone too far this time and alienated the childish and self-absorbed politicians upon whom they rely. I predict Santa Cruz will be getting a 'C' sometime soon.

Thanks to Becky for the tip

An Asthmatic Against the Smoking Ban

Linda Lemaster August 1, 2008 Photo by Becky Johnson




by Lighthouse Linda
October 20, 2009


Last Chance Road, Santa Cruz County, Ca. -- The issue Becky Johnson is educating us about is a very important one, to me. A person's sovereignty is more crucial than the ever-widening freeway of dependency by decree under the state (and "popular opinion, as well, but at least opinion is a more enlivening phenomenon to alter). The other concern is that I/ME, personally, would like to walk where the townspeople can walk, drink from their fountains, stand in their regular queues instead of needing the oft-demeaning "special attention" to get any social, chore, or bureaucratic trafficking done. Two things at odds: why has this frustration "silenced" me?

I am impressed by Becky Johnson's information. She has convinced me that the phenomenon of "secondhand smoke" is one of those mostly-conjured public policies.

This happens. People in positions of power try to oversimplify things and so end up lying to the rest of us. Then there's the other 25% (guessing) of people who are just so fixated on their own trip they care little about integrity or how their words or work affects others. I was glad to see Becky's example of Johnson & Johnson's. They are some of the criminal exploiters who could care LESS about the rest of us as also-human but rather see us as consuming carriers of credit cards - a resource to be had, like aluminum ore or coke for making steel. It leads to THIS: we who prefer to actually be able to think for ourselves (and our families and loved ones, perhaps?) and to take some responsibility -- as best we can -- for our knowledge and our actions are up against such deceit.

I am an asthmatic, now with COPD. I can't even be near some Huffsters who I care deeply about without asthma reactions and risk of immunological breakdowns. I can't breathe at all in many downtown locations. Not even with all the drugs money can buy (or, the state is willing to buy, at any rate, but that's a whole other story!). I am banished in effect because to stay alive, to breathe, I have to avoid toxified air and poisons in many forms.

I have learned much, but the asthma and lungs continue to get worse because we all live in such a cesspool. Granted, less of one in Santa Cruz than most citified places (unless you're on the edge of our otherwise beautiful San Lorenzo River for too long, or hovering over the grease and nitrites of hot dogs at the Boardwalk in order to work, or .....) I mean, it's nicer here than any place I've ever lived, except Seattle. So there! Make of this what you will.

I'm one hundred percent against the new Smoking Ban! The "smoking" gun seems to be just another way to "blame the victim" while the rivers and, in industrial areas and big commuting zones, the air, gets tox'ed to death. I just know that having lived with a husband for seven years who chain smoked, my lungs were not helped a bit. Yet what "did me in," from the best research and study I can manage, is OTHER poisons! Examples follow.

1. The job I had when 1 was 19, 20, and beyond, where I had to inhale the fumes of photo lithography in order to set headlines for daily and weekly newspapers and "trucks" (ad papers) that sold things for supermarkets. "When the red light is on, do not enter." I was too ignorant to realize I needed ventilation (or more) and the only air I could get while at that work station was opening the door, spoiling the work. I was the "bottom man" on the workplace totem pole, not because I was new, but because I was a female. This was a "real" job, before PC's.

2. While I lived with said husband for 7 years, we moved to Santa Cruz and a year later, I had my first asthma attack. But it wasn't his cig habit, it was the illegal (perhaps underground?) business across the generally quiet street. They were spray-painting cars, and refurbishing them. On the curb, two doors from my place. Averaging two cars a week, sometimes more, and doing this work evenings, when everybody in the neighborhood was around. It is possible that the train (two doors going the other direction) contributed too to my lungs' weakening and illness, but it didn't seem apparent at the time. Twice a day trains. I did not realize the car-painting operation was hurting me until I was forced to move for being politically active while parenting (oh! the audacity!). After I moved, I was off the asthma drugs within three days despite other stress-stuff. I was busy and it didn't occur to me that people ran their illegal businesses right out in front of everybody. Never realized I could "turn in" this culprit. By the time I moved, apparently there had been horribly permanent damage in my lungs.

3. Later, the most comfy-cottage home I ever rented in the City of Santa Cruz (was also a homeowner once) turned out to be a Black Mold stronghold. The mold wasn't discovered until a new owner evicted my family and tore the place apart. What a shocking sight! Yet I didn't realize at the time it was extremely toxic for many people. The mold was in only one room, but it caused serious health damage to my daughter and myself, and for all I know, to my younger son who was born while I was living there. Once my doctor asked me, at the emergency room, "How can you get SO sick, yet heal SO fast in here?" He also predicted I'd die, but that was long ago and luckily I got evicted first.

So this is just a little "tip of the iceberg" true story about serious toxic environments that go way beyond "second hand smoke" and its ability to irritate. For me, it means somehow avoiding, perhaps forever: people who wear perfume n cologne, roof tarring, auto diesel exhaust, ammonia products, and all kinds of food additives, and growing. Not an easy task for anyone.

I believe people should do all they can to avoid breathing in poisons, regardless of degree, since we can't really know. We each have a unique pair of lungs and other equipment (hearts, for starters) to sustain them. I am less angry about the lives I got cheated out of because of our collective ignorance and other people's greed or neglect, when I think maybe some people can see my loss as their opportunity to protect and enjoy their own lungs (a “canary”).

My heart is still broken for my son who started smoking young (school culture cinched it), tho' he's quit finally, well into adulthood. I pray for cigarette addicts, that they may recover from the consumer exploitation that's defining much of their lives. All their senses can recover.

Nonetheless, I cannot take sides with those who would conform us all into pigeonholes because they don't know how to do anything socially, community-wise, besides make more laws and further force and predetermine our lives, our behaviors, or our shared destiny. Over-regulation feels just as pre-emptive to me as having to avoid public places and restaurants during mealtimes and happy hour -- finding when they are nearly empty is critical if I go out.

After much internal turmoil, having read Becky's information and arguments on second-hand smoke, and trying to sort my way through my own difficult conflicted feelings, I'm leaning way towards less regulation of public cigarette smoking. Or at the very least, regulate something fair instead of always creating adversarial solutions.

In addition, as one of the people who worked to help pass Prop 215 (which became SB 420 when it passed) I am simply distraught about the fact that cities are over-regulating the use of public marijuana smoking for disabled people. Those folks, because they need nontoxic help, are getting pushed into the paranoid field of an existing "underground" mentality.

It's hard enough to be a crip (disabled, different, etc) without the extra handicap of having to worry about where you can take the one medicine that makes it possible for your system to handle the other more radical drugs (the ones from the pharmaceutical industry) which are perhaps keeping you alive or giving you back some of your mobility or breath etc. My doctor tells me that many people have been able to cut back and even quit some of their drugs with harsh side effects on account of using pot. (I'm not yet one.)

Smokers need to have places they are safe and comfortable, other than in the doorways of "no smoking" buildings (my pet peeve). And if cigarette butts are an issue, put in ashtrays and a sign that EDUCATES people to not litter because of the inevitable pollution our waterways suffer in our blasé ignorance. It doesn't feel good that smokers can't go where other people go. It doesn't feel good that I can't go where others go. And it doesn't feel right that we join those who would punish the victim instead of taking up arms against the more obvious polluters – commercial corporations which seem to pervert or avoid regulatory systems built to protect us. We need a LOUD VOICE, but not to niggle with each other