Apartment smoking ban could happen in Fresno. ‘Your rights end where mine begin’
The Fresno City Council on Thursday voted to ban smoking in multi-unit housing, citing health hazards posed by secondhand and thirdhand smoke.
The proposal, sponsored by Councilmembers Nelson Esparza and Tyler Maxwell, would require housing complexes to ban smoking from inside individual units and only allow it in designated smoking areas. The proposal includes e-cigarettes, vape and hookah devices.
The proposal was introduced Thursday and passed by a 5-2 vote. Councilmembers Garry Bredefeld and Mike Karbassi voted against it. The item will return at a later meeting for final ratification.
Speaking passionately about the issue, Maxwell said, “your rights end where mine begin.”
“Yes, you have the right to smoke, but you don’t have the right to affect other people that don’t want to inhale your second and thirdhand smoke,” he said.
Officials from Fresno County Department of Public Health submitted a letter in support of the ordinance, noting that research shows there’s no risk-free level of exposure to secondhand smoke. Maxwell noted that Fresno also has high rates of asthma in children and adults and many days with bad air pollution, and secondhand and thirdhand smoke exacerbates those health issues.
Councilmember Miguel Arias said when he told his daughter, who has severe asthma, about the proposed policy, she asked: “Why has it taken this long to consider such a common-sense policy?”
Arias said he wished the Fresno County Board of Supervisors would also take up the policy debate.
“A healthier Fresno would mean that we would be less vulnerable during a pandemic as we have seen in this last year and a half,” Arias said.
Councilmember Esmeralda Soria commended young people and the city’s youth commission for building a coalition and proposing the ordinance.
“The science and facts are there,” she said. “This is good policy and I’m ready to support it.”
While many health advocates and residents spoke in favor of the policy, some said it didn’t go far enough. They asked the council to amend the policy to include banning smoking on patios and balconies.
Jennifer Acidera with the California Health Collaborative said she lives in an apartment complex that already has a no-smoking policy for inside units. Still, second-hand smoke from neighbors smoking on balconies and patios drifted into her unit. It became especially problematic during the pandemic shelter-in-place order.
“It just added so much stress, especially having to think about how things would be because I had a baby on the way,” she said. “I understand that people have the right to choose whether they smoke or not, but I also have the right to live a smoke-free life, keep myself, my baby and the rest of my family safe and not be a prisoner in my own home.”
Several councilmembers said they experienced something similar in their living situations.
Evictions, cannabis and squirt guns
Bredefeld objected to parts of the ordinance, saying it would lead to unintended consequences, overburden property owners and discriminate against renters. He also called for the proposal to include measures that would provide services to help people quit smoking.
“It’s going to lead to people being evicted if they don’t stop smoking,” he said.
Bredefeld also called his council colleagues hypocritical since they voted to allow cannabis sales in the city.
Karbassi questioned how realistic it would be to enforce the ordinance. To demonstrate his point, he held up a squirt gun at the dais and suggested equipping code enforcement officers with them to put out cigarettes.
“It’s not loaded and I don’t have a CCW, but this is a very interesting weapon. It’s got plenty of range,” Karbassi said. “So when we go and see someone smoking in their own home, we can fire this and put out that cigarette.”