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January 5, 2009

Fox News:  Illinois Smoking Ban:  One Year Later

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By Sean Conroy, 1/1/09

It was a year ago January 1st that cigarettes were officially snuffed out in Illinois businesses. Casinos, restaurants and bars were fretting, but a year later many say all that worrying was a waste of time.

"I love Marlboro Reds and I love to smoke cigarettes," but for the past 365 days Scott Dinga and his pals have  had to step outside to enjoy those Marlboro Reds. "No I'm not very thrilled with it at all no I'm not," like smoker Brent Bauer many bar owners still are not thrilled either.  "We were scared to death we didn't know what was going to happen," says Butch Davidson, manager at Shenanigan's Pub and Grill in Belleville.  Davidson isn't exactly crazy about the ban but he isn't cursing it either.  "I hear from the salesman and the beer drivers that a lot of people are hurting," says Davidson, "but we are doing good we feel fortunate."  He's fortunate because of food. 

"We have a good food business and its tripled it because we have people who have never came in before." says Davidson.  "I think if it's the same playing field for everybody its doable,"  which is why a year later Derek Betz is not concerned for his business at Fletcher's Kitchen and Tap in Belleville.  What profits the ban took away it has replaced.  "Now as far as alcohol our sales are about the same it's a little earlier happy hour or dinner but the food has actually gone up."  it is so engrained in Betz's mind, that when he works at the Crestwood Fletcher's asking smoking or non sometimes slips his mind. 

The seasoned restauranteur thinks someday soon its a question that may not be needed in St. Louis either.  "The entire city of Kansas City is smoke free Columbia, Missouri is smoke free I think it's a matter of time."

December 23, 2008

santa3.JPGHappy Holidays & Best Wishes for a New Year from Smoke-Free St. Louis City!

We wish you a safe and happy holiday as you celebrate with family & friends. 

Don't forget to check out the smoke-free bars and restaurants directory to breathe clean air as you ring in the New Year in St. Louis!




December 12, 2008

New Study:  Secondhand Smoke Affects Fertility

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Women who breathed in secondhand smoke as children or young adults were later more likely to have trouble getting pregnant and suffer more miscarriages than women not exposed to smoke, U.S. researchers reported Thursday.

They said toxins in the smoke could have permanently damaged the women's bodies, causing the later problems, and said their finding support restrictions on smoking.

Luke Peppone at the University of Rochester in New York, Dr. Kenneth Piazza of the Roswell Park Cancer Institute in Buffalo, New York, and colleagues studied 4,800 women treated at Roswell Park.

They were asked to give details of all pregnancies, attempts to get pregnant, and miscarriages, as well as their history of smoking and breathing secondhand smoke.

Overall, 11 percent of the women reported difficulty becoming pregnant, and about a third lost one or more babies, the researchers wrote in the journal Tobacco Control.

"Forty percent reported any prenatal pregnancy difficulty (fetal loss and/or difficulty becoming pregnant)," they said.

Women who remembered their parents smoking around them were 26 percent more likely to have had difficulty becoming pregnant and women exposed to any secondhand smoke were 39 percent more likely to have had a miscarriage, Peppone's team reported.

Four out of five of the women reported exposure to secondhand smoke during their lifetimes and half grew up in a home with smoking parents.

"These statistics are breathtaking and certainly points to yet another danger of secondhand smoke exposure," Peppone said in a statement.

Other studies have linked smoking with miscarriage, birth defects and sudden infant death syndrome, also known as cot death or crib death.

"The effects of tobacco usage and exposure on pregnancy outcomes remain a public health priority because 15 percent of mothers continue to smoke throughout pregnancy, and an estimated 43 million women in the United States are exposed to cigarette smoke from others," they said.

It is possible that secondhand smoke interferes with normal hormone action involved in fertility and pregnancy, the researchers said. It can also affect the woman's cervix, the opening in the uterus through which sperm passes to fertilize the egg.

(Reporting by Maggie Fox; Editing by Xavier Briand)

NOTE: The study was funded by a National Cancer Institute grant and was previously presented at the Society for Behavioral Medicine and Society of Research of Nicotine and Tobacco conferences.

December 11, 2008

Dallas City Council Votes to Expand Smoking Ban

By DAVE LEVINTHAL, The Dallas Morning News

Smoking soon will be illegal in Dallas bars, billiard halls and most other workplaces after the City Council expanded the municipal smoking ordinance Wednesday.

The council's 10-5 vote generated jubilation citywide, from medical professionals concerned with second-hand smoke's carcinogenic effects to workaday Dallasites who simply hate having a hefty dry-cleaning bill with their pint of pilsner.

It likewise stoked deep worry among bar and billiard hall owners, who fear patrons will take their business to nearby municipalities such as Addison, which feature comparatively liberal smoking regulations.

Dallas will begin enforcing the stronger ordinance April 10. People or businesses found violating it face a $200 fine for each offense.

"Because of this, people are going to lose their jobs," said District 8 council member Tennell Atkins, who voted against the expanded smoking ordinance. "The health issue is a big deal, but people have individual rights. We need to protect that. And we should have vetted this out a lot more before voting."

Said District 14 council member Angela Hunt, who voted for the expansion: "You consistently see bars and restaurants don't generally suffer as a result of smoking bans. And this will make Dallas a much healthier community."

Dallas joins Houston, Austin, Plano and El Paso among Texas cities that have passed strict smoking ordinances. Nearly two dozen states, from New York to California, also feature comprehensive smoking bans.

The council's vote came after a more than four-hour debate on whether to expand Dallas' smoking ordinance, with city leaders entertaining the sometimes emotional comments of dozens of pro- and anti-smoking advocates who nearly filled the council chambers to capacity.

Council members themselves then proposed nearly a dozen floor amendments to the core smoking ordinance proposal.

Some amendments provided additional restrictions - making smoking inside vehicles when children are present a criminal misdemeanor - while others sought to exempt billiard halls, privately contracted meeting rooms and even bars from the ordinance.

All but one failed. The exception: A relatively minor amendment defining a cigar or hookah bar as a business that derives 15 percent of its revenue (down from an original 20 percent) from tobacco products or paraphernalia sales.

That smokers still may puff away in a few, select Dallas cigar bars is little consolation for those who wish to light up in the overwhelming majority of city watering holes.

"I'm a simple country boy from Nebraska, and all I want from politicians is to educate my grandchildren and give me highways I can drive on," said Larry Ihfe, who smoked at the Dallasite bar in East Dallas while watching the council session on television. "I have to have a four-wheel-drive truck to drive the streets in Dallas, and the City Council is more concerned about me smoking in a bar."

Dallas physician Amet Khera disagreed. Today, he said, people who work in bars in an economy where decent jobs are increasingly scarce "choose between their paycheck and their health."

John Carlo, medical director for the Dallas County Department of Health and Human Services, declared flatly, "I have no doubt that second-hand smoke is a risk to the public's health."

Indeed, lobbyists and advocates on all sides of the smoking issue have peppered council members for months with statistics, requests, pitches and pleas in letters, e-mails, phone calls and personal testimony.

Ultimately, however, politicians themselves primarily drove Wednesday's decision, which traces its genesis back nearly two years to Mayor Tom Leppert.

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November 26, 2008

Our new ad up at I-44 West and Kingshighway - check it out!

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November 21, 2008

A Personal Story for Our City to become Smoke-free



"There's a lot of other people like me, that feel the same way I do...just being able to go out...without being exposed to all that smoke would be nice."