KEVIN O’HANLON / The Associated Press | Posted: Thursday, February 23, 2006 6:00 pm
The man who is arguably Nebraska’s most zealous anti-smoking zealot was the target this week of a state senator who wants to make it a crime to file a frivolous complaint against a business for violating the state’s smoking law.
The Judiciary Committee discussed a bill (LB1200) by Sen. Pat Bourne of Omaha aimed at Mark Welsch, president of the Group to Alleviate Smoking Pollution.
Under the measure, filing a frivolous complaint or one that could not be documented against a business for violating the state’s smoking law would be punishable by a $1,000 fine.
Welsch has filed more than 100 complaints against businesses in the past two years, Bourne said, including at least 19 recently against Grand Island businesses.
Welsch said many of the businesses don’t offer all of their services in smoke-free areas.
The Nebraska Clean Indoor Air Act, in effect since 1980, allows businesses to choose whether to allow smoking, ban it, or allow it in designated areas.
“If these businesses, primarily restaurants and bars, were in such violation of the Clean Indoor Air Act so as to endanger the health of the employees and patrons, I find it interesting that no one else filed a complaint,” Bourne said. “To me, these reports of supposed violations seem more like harassment.”
Welsch was in the building and intended to testify at the hearing but missed it because he was conducting other business. But he said afterward it is not faulty reports of violations, but rather the lack of enforcement that constitutes the main problem.
“This is the problem the senators should be concerned about,” he said. “We are afraid that if this bill is passed, other people will be more reluctant to report what they think are violations, because if they are wrong, they could face a stiff fine.”
Under contract with the state in 1999 and 2000, Welsch checked 332 businesses for compliance with the Clean Indoor Air Act.
Welsch found that less than 35 percent of the businesses checked were smoke free. Of the businesses that allowed smoking, 200 out of 217 — or 92 percent, were in violation of the act, Welsch said.
Welsch also expressed concern about how the state would determine an incorrect report was purposely filed.
“Passing a bill such as this into law would only act to further isolate government from those it is to serve,” he said.
Last year, Nebraska lawmakers snuffed out an effort to enact a statewide smoking ban in all restaurants and bars that sell food.
The bill (LB480) by Sen. Nancy Thompson of Papillion — a longtime crusader against tobacco — needed 25 votes to advance to second-round debate. It failed on a vote of 19-to-26.
Bourne failed to amend the bill to preclude cities from enacting smoking bans that are tougher than existing state law.
Bourne said he was concerned that Nebraska could end up with a hodgepodge of local smoking bans. He also said that people who don’t smoke have a choice to not frequent establishments where smoking is allowed.
Lincoln voters approved a smoking ban that went into effect in January 2005 that prohibits smoking in all public buildings — including bars that do not sell food.