Smoking Task Force Discusses Ordinance Implementation

The Outdoor Smoking Ordinance Task Force met again Friday for its final deliberations. Its summary report will be presented to the City Council on Sept. 7.

Now that their summary report will be handed off to the City Council to review, many members at Friday's meeting asked about a time frame for implementation of the ordinance, which would prohibit smoking in outdoor patios and open air spaces at restaurants, bars and other establishments. Some said a time frame of a year was simply too long, while others said it should coincide with the city of Los Angeles' ordinance, which goes into effect in March 2011.

But Steve Gallegos, principal consultant to the Public Health Policy Advocates group and member of the task group, said that if West Hollywood doesn't put something into place soon, the state will.

"We have more and more cities every year passing these ordinances…There are some senators that are interested in this type of an issue. And it's going this way," Gallegos said.

"The thing is when the state enacts this policy they get the opportunity to set the mark on what the acceptable is. We have the opportunity now to make West Hollywood form an ordinance that we can live with," he said.

Task force member Boe Trumbull, who works at nightlife company SBE, which owns the Abbey Food & Bar in Weho, shared a similar concern about whether the state could override the ordinance and nullify what the task force has decided.

Paul Arevalo, city manager for West Hollywood, said the concerns are valid. "If you did not create something," he said, "[the state's ordinance] would then set the standard. When the state comes up with a state policy at a later time, the areas that we have greater restrictions than the state get to stay in place. The areas where our ordinance is weaker [than] the state's standard then we would have to increase."

When the state decides to draft legislation, Arevalo said, it will model it on laws that are in place. The state will also be looking at some of the ordinances from larger cities and will use them as a place to start its work. One such possibility is the outdoor smoking ordinance that the city of Beverly Hills adopted in 2007.  

"If we come up with a strong ordinance that helps shape the state's policy [then] I think that's critical for the work we're doing here," said Arevalo.

On Dec. 21, 2009 the West Hollywood City Council directed the city attorney to draft a comprehensive ordinance.

The task force that was set up to study an ordinance is made up of people from the business community and nonprofit organizations as well as residents and public health advocates. It has discussed issues such as the economic effect on the city, buffer zones to areas where smoking is prohibited, and smoking and tobacco use exemptions.

At Friday's task force meeting, Arevalo said the goal is to get the ordinance finalized before the end of the calendar year.