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DUBUQUE - Smoke-free, a law in Iowa that bar owners have been dreading for years, and that anti-smoking groups have been hoping for. As of July 1 a state wide smoking ban in all public places, excluding casinos, will go into effect in Iowa, leading Iowa smokers outside to smoke.
“The smokers will get used to smoking out front but for the city’s bar and restaurant owners it is going to be messy because there will be people smoking in the entry ways,“ says The Dog House bar owner Bob Leytem.
Leytem explains other states that have enacted a state wide smoking ban have been affected negatively by the change.
“Other states have said their business has dropped off quite a bit, Illinois has dropped around 20 to 25 percent and Minnesota even more,” added Leytem.
For Anti-Tobacco groups in Dubuque these numbers are up for debate.
“Illinois and Minnesota have gone smoke free and we have seen no detrimental effects yet, it seems like business as usual,” says Hillcrest Anti-Tobacco Coordinator Angie Brandel.
One of the exemptions to the ban has business owners questioning the government’s decision.
“I think it is hypocritical to allow smoking in casinos, if they are going to ban smoking for one business it should be all businesses,” says owner of Players Sports Bar David Loreny.
Regardless of the mixed feelings towards the ban, this summer the smoke free bill will go into effect in Iowa, requiring bar and restaurant owners, along with their patrons to make a change.
Morgan Finke can be reached at Morgan.Finke@loras.edu
June 30th, 2008 at 7:42 pm
the law to ban smoking in restaurants is fine. to have a bar required to adhere to this is ludicrous. if you want to go to a bar that’s nonsmoking then go to one. this is just another way of the government telling business owners how to run their business. what is next? let people be responsible for their own decisions on their health. of course we couldn’t have the casinos lose money, that would be detrimental to the state. what a bunch of hypocrites! i certainly will not vote for those who voted for this law again. i don’t even smoke and i think it is a stupid law.
July 1st, 2008 at 5:48 pm
I presume it’s a matter of public record how the lawmakers voted on this. I would like to be able to find — or have someone send me — a list of the lawmakers who voted for this unfair law.
I would then send it to everyone I know, and they in turn would fwd it on, etc.
And then, come the next election, everyone would know who to vote out of office. They all deserve it, since many if not most of the people who voted AGAINST the ban, said they did so simply because it was so glaringly unfair. (right on).
So they should be rewarded by being voted back in whilst the people who voted for the law be similarly rewarded by being voted out.
If anyone can procure a page stating how the final vote on this went, PLEASE POST IT HERE, and let’s get this party started!
July 2nd, 2008 at 11:36 am
I’m a smoker and I have no problem with a smoking ban in certain locations. Hospitals, Governmanet buildings, movie theatres, Malls and the basic public businesses but when it comes to bars the ban should be voluntary to each bar owner.I can understand that children go to most public places but bars are for adults and adults should be allowed to smoke in an adult environment if they so choose to. If a bar wants to ban smoking then that is good but if they choose to allow it then the patrons need to locate a smoke free bar. Too many drinkers smoke. Even people who wouldn’t normally smoke tend to do so when drinking. If casinos are exempt then bars need to be aswell. This is just another example of how we’re slowly losing our freedoms and how certain special interest groups control things. Althought the poll on this page is unofficial it indicates that 83% of the 133 polled don’t approve of the law and it should make leaders wake up and realize that it could cause alot of our legislayors and even the governor to be voted out in the next elections. I feel tha law should be placed on a public ballot for approval or rejection. It’s the people’s choice not the governments to decide if smoking ashould be banned.
July 3rd, 2008 at 8:54 am
I think U.S.A it was call the country of freedom and now it should be call the country of NO freedom.
Think about it:
You go to a public pool and first thing you see is
No running
No glass containers
No diving, no no no
In a store
No shoes, no shirt, no service…
With the seat belts, I use a seat belt but I feel it should be my choice
Why is it that school buses do not have seat belts and booster seats?
And now the smoking? That is a choice that an adult have, we know is bad, but is our choice… What about all the hormones, pesticides and junk that goes into our meat and produce that we buy and we do not have a choice but to eat it and what is worse give it to our kids?
July 3rd, 2008 at 8:42 pm
OK, I just read an article about the cool new smoking ban in Iowa. It included the voting record for the House and Senate, stating which lawmakers voted for and voted against it.
It is worth noting that almost all of the Democrats voted for the ban, while almost all the Republicans voted against it.
Well, at least we don’t have to wonder anymore why their cash-cows, the Casinos, were conveniently exempted from the new law whilst the bar owners had the rug pulled out from under them.
Many Iowa bars were probably fledgling anyway; and more than a few of them probably even had to deal with being flooded — and now this.
Many of the really small towns only have the local watering hole as one of the few extant businesses left in the town.
The lawmakers knew it would be bad for the bar business; the fact that they exempted the casinos proves it.
Plus, if there was supposedly such a demand for smoke free bars, there would already be plenty of them — but there isn’t.
Some claimed it would bring more non-smokers into the bars. But people who don’t smoke don’t drink much either. Plus, the same logic should have applied to the casinos — it’d bring more non smokers in, right?
What a joke.
If they couldn’t have done it more equitably, they shouldn’t have done it at all. It should be an embarrassment to our lawmakers to serve up something that lame.
But anyway, if you want to know how to vote out of office the geniuses who gave you this law, it turns out to be really simple: Don’t vote Democrat!!
July 6th, 2008 at 10:02 am
I to think this law is a joke. What will the lawmakers come up with next. What brand of Beer can be served at tbe bar. No smoking should be up to the bar owners.This is AMERICA land of the free. People are going to smoke out side bars and leave there mess. So will our lawmakers come and clean it up? I do not think so. I will not vote Democrat.
July 7th, 2008 at 9:50 am
There has been talk about filing suit against the discriminatory nature of the smoking ban because of it’s exempting the casinos, but I read in the paper that if such a lawsuit is brought forth, they will eliminate the casino exemption before they will bring back smoking in bars.
But I find that hard to believe, since the state government is addicted to that casino money as much as any smoker is to tobacco. Hence I can’t fathom that they would do anything which would compromise their income from that. They REALLY don’t want to stop people from smoking in the casino.
Can you imagine someone in a casino walking away from the slot machine they’re playing to go have a smoke, and then come back in to find someone else playing their machine — collecting a large payout??
Of course, one could pose the arguement that gambling, after all, is such a powerful addiction (happily sponsored by the State) that the hoardes of people with that disease won’t stop going in there — smoking or not. That might be a ‘gamble’ the legislators are willing to take.
Speaking of gambling, I don’t remember ever hearing about anyone losing their entire paycheck in one sitting because he smoked cigarettes.
But I guess if someone gambles away his whole paycheck, leaving no money for rent or blls, no milk in the house for the kids, ect. (and we know THAT’S never happened) — remember, it could be worse: He could be smoking a cigarette in the corner bar.
See, the Democrats have decided for you that it’s MUCH better if he’s smoking in the casino rather than in a bar. In the bar, he couldn’t spend much more than a twenty, which goes to the businessman who owns the bar; whereas in the casino he could easily spend TWENTY TIMES that much, ALL of which the Democrats get their grubby little paws on.
I just had an epiphany: Perhaps we shouldn’t vote for Democrats. Hmmm… Ya think?
But maybe there’s some good in all this: Since they can’t smoke in bars, the smokers will only have one drink in the bar, and then go home and spend the rest of the evening smoking around their kids, thus indoctrinating them to become smokers themselves when they grow up; and hence the government will make ever more money from cigarette taxes.
I’m only half-joking. Democrats, after all, rarely if ever do anything without it resulting in their getting more money.
Government is supposed to come FROM the people — not at them. I want this whole debacle to be held up as a SHINING EXAMPLE of the Democratic agenda.
Anybody out there still think it’s not important to vote??
July 9th, 2008 at 6:41 am
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July 23rd, 2008 at 10:04 pm
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July 27th, 2008 at 5:02 am
Why would you say that?
November 18th, 2008 at 7:54 am
I think this ban should go for all public places. Some of you say those of us who don’t smoke can go to a smoke-free bar. Well, in a small town you can’t do that. If there was no ban they would all be smoking. How is it fair to us to have to sit and breath in all that smoke? We have the right to be in the bar too. We have the right to be there and not have to be around the smoke. Some of you need to look at the whole picture and not just part of it.