PA legislature takes more steps to ban smoking

Governor Rendell supports effort

By TOM KANE

HARRISBURG, PA – Pennsylvania legislators and Governor Ed Rendell don’t like the sobriquet of “ashtray of the Northeast” which has been hung on the state recently.

Pennsylvania stands alone among neighboring states without a ban on smoking. New York, Delaware and New Jersey have enacted comprehensive bans on workplace smoking while counties in Maryland and West Virginia and cities in Ohio, like Columbus and other smaller towns, have imposed their own regulations.

Proponents of a ban on smoking in the Pennsylvania House and Senate are moving ahead with hearings, the first one to be held on Thursday, May 31 at a House Health and Human Services Committee at West Scranton High School.

House Representatives Frank Andrew Simkus, D-South Abington, and Michael Gerber, D-Montgomery, have introduced a version of an anti-smoking bill while State Senator Stewart Greenleaf, R-Montgomery, has his own version.

The legislation is not without its opponents, chief of whom is Senate Minority Leader Sam Smith, R-Jefferson County, who is opposed because it is another intrusion of the state into business.

Smith, however, does support an anti-smoking bill for state buildings, according to Smith’s public relations director Steve Miskin.

Last week, the City of Scranton was forced to drop its ban on smoking after a state appeals court struck down an Allegheny County smoking ban earlier. Scranton officials decided they lacked authority to continue the city’s ban.

“The governor has included a ban in his Prescription for Pennsylvania proposal,” said Doug Rohanna, director of communications for the Governor’s office.

The bill has not yet reached the floor of either house but is expected to do so soon, Rohanna said.

Scranton’s actions indicate that the battle against smoking has shifted to the state capital.