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Smoking ban goes to House
Plan voted down twice in the last four years
State Rep. Hugh Holliman, D-Davidson, says he has gathered new supporters for his proposal.
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Published: March 25, 2009
RALEIGH - Twice in the last four years, state Rep. Hugh Holliman has fought for broad restrictions on smoking in North Carolina. Twice in the last four years, Holliman has seen his bills get narrowly defeated on the floor of the N.C. House.
Holliman, D-Davidson, will soon get a third chance.
And this time, the restrictions he is pushing are even broader than the ones he has proposed in the past.
As soon as next week, the House will take up a bill sponsored by Holliman that would ban smoking in restaurants, bars and virtually all other indoor workplaces and public buildings in North Carolina.
The primary goal, according to Holliman and other sponsors of the bill, is to protect workers and members of the public from the health hazards of secondhand smoke.
But as with past attempts to restrict public smoking, the bill faces opposition from people concerned about the rights of business owners and from some legislators who represent tobacco-rich parts of the state.
The bill was approved yesterday by a House judiciary committee. It will now go to the House floor -- and Holliman is focused on drumming up enough votes to get it passed in the 120-member chamber.
"Certainly, we need to check votes," said Holliman, who, as the House majority leader, is the Democrats' chief vote counter. "What's stayed the same (from two years ago) is that it's a pretty big debate. I think the vote will be fairly close."
If it is passed by the House, the bill will be sent to the N.C. Senate. Holliman said that the bill may face an easier road there than in the House. Gov. Bev Perdue has said she will sign the bill if it gets to her desk.
In 2005, Holliman first pushed to ban smoking in the state's restaurants. When that didn't get enough support, he tried to require all restaurants to have a nonsmoking section. That bill was rejected in the House on a 62-58 vote.
In 2007, Holliman again tried for a smoking ban in restaurants. It was voted down in the House by a vote of 61-55.
This year, the House has some new faces, and Holliman said that "three or four" legislators who voted against the 2007 bill have committed to support his bill this time around.
This year's bill goes further than the previous years' bills because it deals not just with restaurants but also with all indoor places that are open to the public or that have any employees.
It has very limited exceptions: For instance, smoking would be permitted in tobacco shops or in a maximum of 20 percent of rooms at a hotel.
State Rep. Paul "Skip" Stam, R-Wake, criticized the bill yesterday as taking the wrong approach.
"What this bill does is push smoking out of places where there are principally adults and into places where minors are," said Stam, the House minority leader.
He said that instead of prohibiting adults from smoking, the legislature should focus on ways to prevent minors from smoking.
Most Republicans oppose Holliman's bill. Some Democrats who represent districts whose economies are based on tobacco also oppose it.
Holliman said yesterday that he doesn't believe that his bill will hurt the economy because, he said, people will continue to smoke -- just not in indoor public places.
"I don't see this bill doing anything, or having a major impact, on the number of people who smoke," he said.
That sentiment, however, conflicts with a message that he and other supporters of the bill have repeatedly made in recent weeks: that one benefit of public smoking bans is that they help smokers quit.
Another hurdle for Holliman's bill is the brewing fight over a different tobacco issue: a proposal by Perdue to raise taxes on cigarettes by $1 a pack.
In North Carolina, which remains the nation's largest producer of tobacco, some legislators are reluctant to pass a series of strongly anti-tobacco laws.
"It could give the impression of piling on," Holliman acknowledged.
"But you know, the tax proposal has got a long way to go. As does my bill."
He said that Democrats in the House have not decided whether to support Perdue's proposal for a tax increase on cigarettes.
■ James Romoser can be reached at 919-210-6794 or at jromoser@wsjournal.com.
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