The Next Step for Smoking Bans

For those of you who are wondering where the smoking ban mania will reach next, look no further than this story. 

But for Anna Maria Gabriel, who lives in West Bend Terrace Apartments, the biggest drawback isn’t noisy neighbors, but rather their smoking habits, which she claims is polluting the air in her unit.

[...]

“By this summer I was totally surrounded by smokers,” she said. “I told (the manager) that the purifier wasn’t handling it. I was getting no response. They knew that I was a nonsmoker and they were surrounding me with smokers.”

[...]

Gabriel claims she is still “choking” because of the cigarette odor. To breathe clean air, Gabriel said she invested in a $795 air purifier, which seems to be working.

The justifications for the smoking ban are:

1) Smoking kills and people who choose not to smoke have a right to breathe smoke-free air.

2) People who work in heretofore smoky areas shouldn’t have to do so.

Why can’t these justifications be applied to apartments or houses that are close together?  They can, and they will.

We are barrelling toward a point where the only people who will be allowed to smoke are single people who live in the dead center of a 100 acre farm.

On a related note…

In this same story, the behavior of the woman who doesn’t like smoke demonstrates just how little responsibility some people take for their own lives. 

“She wrote a letter and said there was smoke coming up from her bathroom fan, cigarette smoke,” said Haas. “I contacted an electrician on January 30 and asked him to set up a call with Anna to have it checked out.”

Haas said a date was set but that Gabriel cancelled the appointment at the last minute. She said Gabriel was given “numerous choices” to set up an alternate appointment with the electrician, but Gabriel claimed she couldn’t commit to a date until March.

[...]

Gabriel asked the management to reimburse her for the air purifier, but was refused, she said. So, Gabriel decided to withhold part of her rent until the air purifier was paid for, citing a Wisconsin statute to back up her claim. She also hired an attorney, who de-clined to comment for this story.

The landlord schedules an electrician to accomodate the woman, but she cancels the appointment and can’t find time to reschedule it.  Then she buys an air purifier and seems to think that the landlord should pay for it.  Notice a pattern?  In her mind, her problems are always somebody else’s responsibility.  It is exactly that kind of mentality that leads to people supporting things like smoking bans. 

1. The pattern here is on a much grander scale.  Those things in life that annoy us need to be banned.  It’s that simple.  Laws are no longer held in high regard, as they must be changed every year to accomodate a new sector of society that is currently annoyed.  Rights of law-abiding citizens, thus, are trampled on by these small, but vocal, minorities who believe it is the government’s obligation to protect people from every annoyance in life.  We, as a society, have truly lost our way.

   Posted by on February 28, 2007 at 1418 hrs




2. "In her mind, her problems are always somebody else’s responsibility.  It is exactly that kind of mentality that leads to people supporting things like smoking bans.  “… or gay marriage bans, bans on hemp or pot....etc. etc. etc.

   Posted by on February 28, 2007 at 1450 hrs




3. I live in an upper flat, the people in the lower flat smoke. Generally they keep it in their apartment but occasionally the back stairwell (which we share) will get stunk up. And once our apartment got polluted (I think they may have been smoking in the basement and it came up through the furnace ducts). This is annoying, but not miserable. If it gets bad, I will talk to my neighbors before I talk to my landlord. If it gets really bad I will move, no one is forcing me to live where I do. The same way that no one is forcing me to patronize or work at smokey bars.

   Actually this lady does have a somewhat valid point, her apartment should not be sharing air with other apartments and it is the landlord’s job to fix this problem, however her way of going about this was all wrong and very irresponsible.

   Posted by Matt on February 28, 2007 at 1504 hrs




4. I don’t like the smell of alcohol based perfumes, they must be banned.  I’m none too fond of the smell of bourbon, that too must be banned.  If you are wearing perfume, or drinking bourbon, or doing both at the same time, you must be banned. 

   

   Posted by Kate on February 28, 2007 at 1741 hrs




5. Shoveling snow annoys me and is bad for my health; it should be banned.  Also, there is too much snow and ‘Big Snow’ is accumulating at record amounts.  ‘Big Snow’ should be taxed.  It snows every year, thus we have yet to end our addiction to snow.  Therefore, we must come up with alternatives to snow and mandate those alternatives on the people of Wisconsin.  Government has a responsibility to protect its citizens from all this snow.

   Posted by on February 28, 2007 at 1756 hrs




6. Another wench-with-attitude strikes Wisconsin.

   Obviously, she attended the Professional Complainer Class, usually held by public employee unions as part of Piss & Moan 101 for Contract Enhancements.

   Posted by dad29 on February 28, 2007 at 1839 hrs




7. The landlord has several options in this case and I don’t think he is responsible for paying for the air purifier.

   He can issue Terry Tenant a 12-Hour Notice and then he has the right to enter her apt. during regular business hours and get the electrician into the unit to check things out. She does not have to be present but she can be there if she wishes to.

   His second option is to issue the tenant a 28-Day Notice to vacate. He does not need a reason to give her such a notice and this assumes that she is on a month to month rental agreement.

   It sounds as though Terry Tenant simply wants a free ride so it is in the best interests of this landlord to just get rid of her.

   Beyond all of that, the Original meaning of the word “Regulate” did not include the power to prohibit, such as prohibit smoking. If you look back at the historical meaning of the word “Regulation” it meant “to make regular” rarely to prohibit. In the rare instances that a regulation did include a prohibition, it was generally meant to prohibit fraud in the conduct of trade between states and other such activities.

   This is another case of liberals and progressives simply re-writing the Constitution. If “We the People” don’t stand up for our rights and our property, soon, there will be very little left to fight for.

   Posted by on February 28, 2007 at 1920 hrs




8. A reminder of why I never want to be a landlord—unless there is a website somewhere to tell me if prospective tenants are narcissists.

   The smoking ban movement is out of control.  Shorewood is the latest Milwaukee suburb to get on board—and with the most harsh ban yet, with no hardship clause for businesses hit by declining sales.  And this is in a suburb that has gotten a lot of our tax funds to build a commercial base to relieve homeowners’ property taxes.  It may even prohibit smoking in restaurants’ outdoor patios.  I already have seen people tell smokers to stop in outdoor patios in Milwaukee.

   And remember the story, from out East, of an employer with a ban on smoking by workers—who fired a worker seen smoking at home.  The next story here, though, will be on UW campuses with total bans on the way, as at UWM next summer—because the nannies plan to include public streets and sidewalks through the campus.  So we will be paying for state workers to ticket smokers—and then paying for losing lawsuits, too.

   Posted by on March 01, 2007 at 0942 hrs




9. The story from out east of the smoker fired for smoking at home is a bit more invidious.  The worker was given a random drug screen (urinalisys) which showed nicotine.  The worker was pointed to the “drug policy” which included nicotine and fired.

   Posted by chris on March 03, 2007 at 0032 hrs




10. cigarette smoke changes otherwise okay air into air that is unhealthy to breath. Of course, the easiest way to eliminate unhealthy air, due to cigarette smoke, is to quit smoking, but not everyone wants to. If that is the case with you or with someone inside your household, you are urged to examine what an air purifier can do for you.

    Air purifiers are electronic devices that are used to clean up the air. They do this by reducing or completely eliminating the number of harmful air particles or contaminants in the air. In most cases, depending on the air purifier, this is done with the use of a filter A filter, will work to prevent these air particles from passing through the grid. Essentially, this makes the air coming out of the machine cleaner and healthier.

    Posted by Air Purifying on February 23, 2008 at 1430 hrs




11. JUST CHECKING!!;)

    Posted by Calabash Rouge on May 06, 2008 at 1040 hrs