City council Tuesday night discussed extending its citywide smoking ban to include multi-family units and to regulate the sale of tobacco. The council is scheduled to vote on the ordinance on Sep. 15.
The council banned smoking throughout the city in June 2014. Since then, it’s issued 28 written warnings and 17 citations. In January, it asked staff to come back with proposed rules for multifamily housing and tobacco retail licensing.
Environmental Programs Manager Sona Coffee said that the proposed ordinance was based on one passed in October by Culver City, which became the 16th city in the state to enact such a law, joining cities such as Santa Monica and Pasadena.
Not everyone agreed with all the legislation discussed. Councilmember David Lesser thought it was unfair to people living in multi-family housing, especially since houses in Manhattan Beach are so close.
“If one has the means to buy a single-family house, they can smoke to their heart’s content,” he said. “As one who supports prohibiting smoking in public, to take away the right of people to smoke who live in multi-family units goes too far.”
However, a council majority appeared to be in favor of outlawing smoking not just outside multi-unit residences, defined as having three or more attached units, but inside as well. The majority also appeared to want to ban having any designated smoking areas on the these properties, of which there are 340 in the city.
Coffee asked the council if they wanted to create an exception for e-cigarettes, which are banned outdoors in the city through the current ordinance.
“We heard arguments on both sides,” said Coffee. “Some people think vapor doesn’t travel as much; some share ventilation systems.”
The council seemed inclined not to make an exception.
They decided to have a date by which all residences must comply; that date would be determined when they voted on the ordinance, but would probably be within 12 to 18 months.
One issue which arose was enforcement. In a letter to the council, the South Bay Association of Realtors worried that owners could be held legally responsible if their tenants smoked. However, the ordinance would not make property owners or managers responsible for patrolling smoking, but for having proper signage and notification. A former Pasadena enforcement officer who attended the meeting suggested having fees related to the ban fund an enforcement effort.
The council debated whether to include Manhattan Village as a multi-unit property. They decided that it fit the definition. Coffee said its homeowners association was considering enforcing the ban whether it was passed by the council.
The council also appeared to be mostly in favor of requiring businesses which want to sell tobacco to get a permit from the city, in addition to the permit issued by the state.
There are 21 businesses licensed by the state to sell tobacco products in the city and one e-cigarette shop, which isn’t required to have a state license. A few wrote letters opposing the city’s proposal.
Coffee asked if the council wanted to restrict the sale of flavored tobacco products which can appeal to young people. They mostly said yes, with a couple of exceptions. They decided they would give retailers a date by which they would have to stop selling the products that would allow them to get rid of current inventory. Councilmember Powell noted that they had done something similar with their plastic bag ban.
The proposed ordinance would limit where shops selling tobacco could be opened to keep them away from youth and to keep shops from proliferating in one area. Shops would have to be at least 1,000 feet from schools and 500 feet other tobacco retailers. The council also said it would consider whether to add parks and youth-oriented facilities to the law. Currently, there are six retailers within 1,000 of a school or park. ER
