A bill proposing to ban all tobacco products in county parks almost turned into a resolution weeks ago, which would take away its enforcement component. Rather, the bill was sent back to committee and now has morphed into an anti-smoking bill. “It would have been a lot easier if it was a total ban, but we are looking for a win-win situation here,” Kaua‘i County Councilman Dickie Chang said at the council meeting Wednesday.
The council’s Parks and Recreation Committee, on its second round of dealing with the bill, on Wednesday recommended by a 3-2 vote that the full council approve the bill next week. Bill 2437 has been bouncing around the council since Chang first introduced it on May 23, when it passed first reading. The Parks and Recreation Committee deferred the bill June 20, and on July 5 the bill squeezed out of the committee by a 3-2 vote. On July 11, at the full council for final and second reading, both sides of the issue — the Coalition for a Tobacco Free Hawai‘i and those who opposed the ban — were not satisfied with the bill’s final version. Instead of working on further amendments, the council sent the bill back to committee for additional work.
On Wednesday, Councilman Tim Bynum said the majority of major hotels, resorts and condominiums have been converting to non-smoking facilities. As a result, they have designated public parks and beaches as smoking areas for their guests. One of those hotels on the island’s Eastside has gone to the extent of placing on public property a receptacle for cigarette butts, he said. The bill is supposed to be back at full council for second reading next Wednesday. As it is now, the bill would no longer have a straight ban on tobacco products, and would impose a fine on those who “smoke or carry a lighted cigar, cigarette, pipe, or use any spark, flame or fire-producing device to light any of the aforementioned smoking devices.”
In other words, chewing tobacco or using it for different purposes would still be legal in county parks, as long as there is no fire or smoking involved. However, the bill, once a straight ban, would still allow smoking in a designated area in county parks — the parking lot. But smokers would have to move “at least 20 feet farthest downwind from the nearest park user who is using the park area adjacent to the parking lot,” according to the bill. And if a park’s parking lot is being used as the primary venue for an event, such as Wednesday’s Sunshine Market at Kapa‘a New Town Park, there would be no smoking allowed there.
First offenders would be fined at least $100. The fine grows to at least $200 on a second offense and between $300 and $500 on subsequent offenses. Valerie Saiki, representing the Coalition for a Tobacco Free Hawai‘i, had opposed the bill’s final version when it had reached full council July 11.
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