Posted June 29, 200420 yr I'm pissed. I smoke at bars and this sucks. FUCK COLUMBUS! Council Passes Citywide Smoking Ban Bill To Go Into Effect In 90 Days POSTED: 8:47 pm EDT June 28, 2004 UPDATED: 8:54 pm EDT June 28, 2004 COLUMBUS, Ohio -- City council voted Monday night to ban smoking in Columbus bars, bowling alleys and restaurants, NewsChannel 4's Monique Ming Laven reported. The original ordinance was amended to allow smoking in outdoor patio areas and the elimination of escalating fines and a 20-foot smoke-free zone outside the establishment. A representative from Mayor Michael Coleman's office said the mayor expects advocates of the bill to lobby surrounding communities to join the city and pass their own smoking bans. If the communities do not, more amendments could be made to the bill, Laven reported. http://www.nbc4columbus.com/news/3470805/detail.html
June 29, 200420 yr ^I guess not. That's fine though. I'm just going to go to the bars in the suburbs. I will not spend my money in Columbus anymore. In fact, anything I buy from now on will be in the suburbs.
June 29, 200420 yr I'm guessing at least half of the people who smoke at bars aren't full time smokers. I know a lot of my friends that will only smoke when they are out drinking. I just wish they would have allowed the free market to decide whether to go smoke free. If the demand is there then there should be plenty of non-smoking bars for people to patronize. When are they going to outlaw industrial plants that pollute our air??? I just hope this doesn't hurt the downtown bars and restaraunts too much.
June 29, 200420 yr Ahem. You people do realize that Gahanna, New Albany, Hilliard, Dublin, and Reynoldsburg are also "in talks" of BANNING smoking as well, correct? Thus, Tuttle, Peremeter, Easton area, etc will also be smoke free. This is simply a cause-effect issue, and more and more suburbs will follow suit. Also, you also realize that you can smoke in outdoor dining. Seems fair. "You don't just walk into a bar and mix it up by calling a girl fat" - buildingcincinnati speaking about new forumers
June 29, 200420 yr Notice I said "dining areas." Bars, who knows. Though some bars in Columbus have outdoor patios (Brothers, Brazenhead, Four Kegs, etc). "You don't just walk into a bar and mix it up by calling a girl fat" - buildingcincinnati speaking about new forumers
June 29, 200420 yr none of the good bars have patios Then don't bother visiting Blues Station in the Arena District.
June 30, 200420 yr uhh.....winter? uhh...patch? "You don't just walk into a bar and mix it up by calling a girl fat" - buildingcincinnati speaking about new forumers
June 30, 200420 yr none of the good bars have patios Then don't bother visiting Blues Station in the Arena District. i didnt mean a patio makes a bar bad, just all the bars ive been to that i like are patio-less.
June 30, 200420 yr Ugh.... Whatever. My feeling is, the "owners" of bars and other venues should have the choice of whether or not they should be smoke free. We as a free society should not be stripped of our rights. If a bar decides to be smoke free, then it should be my American right to choose on whether or not I want to go to that establishment. I guarantee you that those 5 people who voted yes to ban smoking would never step foot in the type of bar or club I choose to go to.
June 30, 200420 yr Yeah, I don't get it for bars. Restaurants and workplaces I can go along with, but I've always felt that bar owners should be able to decide.
February 11, 200520 yr Bars may be exempt...from the 2/11/05 Enquirer: Columbus voters will be asked to exempt bars from smoking ban The Associated Press COLUMBUS, Ohio - A proposal to exempt bars from the citywide smoking ban has qualified for the May 3 ballot. The Franklin County Board of Elections said on Thursday that petitions circulated by bar owners contained more than the necessary 4,991 valid signatures. Now the Columbus City Council must place the issue before voters or enact the exemption itself, which isn't expected to happen. The initiative would exempt establishments where alcohol sales make up at least 65 percent of the business. - - - Information from: The Columbus Dispatch, http://www.dispatch.com http://news.enquirer.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050211/NEWS/502120306
February 11, 200520 yr holy smokes! thats a biggie. sounds like a step back re the smoke ban if it is passed no? thx grasscat!
February 11, 200520 yr Later, Tavares, who pushed for the ban, said it was all about fairness. "It doesn't seem fair to carve out exemptions for other businesses," she said. - - - nothing about the smoking ban is fair
February 11, 200520 yr I saw on the news the other night a report about a bar owner who is conspicuously (obviously, since it attracted news coverage) flouting the ban and collecting donations to pay the fines he expects to incur. He was doing pretty well with his collections, but I wouldn't expect that to last forever. (I have nothing substantive to add to this discussion; I just thought the story was kinda interesting.)
February 11, 200520 yr Actually It's a misdemeanor right? Which means it could be jail time if the fine is not paid.
February 11, 200520 yr Fort Wayne's ordinance exempts private clubs, so there were a few places that declared themselves private clubs and sold lifetime memberships for a dollar. The only one of those I was ever in was a neighborhood cafe on Wells Street where the grease would have killed you with coronary artery disease long before cigarettes could have done it.
February 11, 200520 yr Does anyone think this will pass, though? I get the feeling (based on the last vote) that unless someone is extremely passionate about this, they'll probably just vote for the status quo. On the other hand, the fact that it's not an important election may help the exemption to pass, as only those who care about the issue will bother going to the polls. In other words, who knows what the hell will happen?
February 12, 200520 yr ^ Yeah, I really went out on a limb there with my "not committing to any certain prediction"!
February 12, 200520 yr As a non-smoker... I am against a smoking ban. I do not feel that it is right to force a business owner to run his/her business in a certain way. I feel that the business owner and customers are aware of the "health risk" that are involved by going to a bar. It should be the peoples' choice, if they do not want to be around smoke, then do not go. “…man is not free unless government is limited. There's a clear cause and effect here that is as neat and predictable as a law of physics: As government expands, liberty contracts.” - Ronald Reagan
February 12, 200520 yr I am not against it. If it prevents one person from getting cancer from second hand smoke.it's worth it.
February 13, 200520 yr COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Columbus voters will get another chance to vote on the city's smoking ban, NBC 4 reported. The Columbus City Council is expected to place an initiative on the May ballot that would, if passed, exempt businesses that get 65 percent of their revenue from alcohol sales. Nearly every bar in Columbus would qualify for the exemption, NBC 4's David Wayne reported. Read more: http://www.nbc4i.com/news/4186398/detail.html?rss=col&psp=news
February 14, 200520 yr I am not against it. If it prevents one person from getting cancer from second hand smoke.it's worth it. What else are you willing to give up to prevent one person getting cancer? Making red meat illegal? Butter illegal? Potato Chips?
February 14, 200520 yr Come on, common sense tells you to ban it in public. People eat stuff is their own choosing. That dosen't effect other people. All the above that you mention it's not labled to cause cancer. It can happen if you eat a huge amount if it every day. Which is highly unlikely.
May 4, 200520 yr like it or not, it's a marketable sign of a progressive big city, any wonder it's ohio's only boomtown? way to go grabbing the positive pr columbus! Columbus voters say no again to smoking in workplace 5/3/2005, 10:30 p.m. ET The Associated Press COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — For the second time in the last year, Columbus voters stubbed out smoking in the city's public places. A group of bar owners wanted a city-wide smoking ban lifted for their establishments, claiming their sales were down. With 99 percent of precincts reporting Tuesday night, the measure was being defeated by a margin of 55 percent to 44 percent. Passage of Issue 2 would have allowed smoking in establishments where alcohol accounts for 65 percent of sales. www.dispatch.com
May 4, 200520 yr I was in Columbus last weekend (my wife's 15 year high school reunion), and Friday we went to a cigar, wine and beer place that allowed smoking. So there are definitely exceptions - just probably very few...
May 4, 200520 yr ^hmm, what was the place? was it in grandview or another place outside of city limits?
May 4, 200520 yr Damn...I'm trying to remember - when I wrote that, I thought it was right on High Street, but that was Saturday night...someplace west of downtown, but I don't remember where. I'll find out and repost...
May 4, 200520 yr Spagio's Cellar, on Grandview at West 2nd in Grandview Heights. So I guess that's outside the city limits? If it were inside the limits, would they have to disallow smoking, or is there an exception for a cigar bars? I was under the impression that even the stricter version of the Cincinnati ban would have allowed the Havana Martini Club to stay in business (which, as a cigar bar, means allowing smoking inside).
May 4, 200520 yr yes, grandview is outside of city limits. the only places in columbus that allowing smoking would be private clubs, so if spagio cellar was in columbus, it would be banned. (kinda neat how i guessed grandview, eh? that place was the first thing that came to mind...the windows have large words on them saying Cigars Beer and Wine, or something like that..)
May 4, 200520 yr I wonder if the smoking ban will have any effect on convention business. I mean you can host your convention in a city with smoking and nonsmoking bars or one where there are only non smoking bars. I guess we will see.
May 4, 200520 yr (kinda neat how i guessed grandview, eh? that place was the first thing that came to mind...the windows have large words on them saying Cigars Beer and Wine, or something like that..) <darth vader voice>impressive</darth vader voice>... I guess I assumed that since Columbus has annexed everything from Coshocton to Grand Lake St. Mary's, that Grandview would have been taken down for the count, but I was obviously quite wrong!
May 4, 200520 yr I guess I assumed that since Columbus has annexed everything from Coshocton to Grand Lake St. Mary's, that Grandview would have been taken down for the count, but I was obviously quite wrong! Columbus has not tried to annex previously plotted municipalities. Thus Grandview Hts, Marble Cliff, Upper Arrlington, Worthington, Bexley, and Whitehall are all safe from Columbus taking them over. :-)
May 4, 200520 yr I currently live in brooklyn, ny and I must say I LOVE the smoking ban. I've always been a 'social smoker' and never really realized how much public smoking bothered me until it went away. I'm a fan of individuals' rights to do whatever they want to their own bodies, but you can't get around the fact that smoking doesn't only effect the person who's doing it. I have no right to complain when I'm sitting next to someone who's eating lots of mercury-filled swordfish or chewing tobacco b/c it doesn't personally effect me. Plus, it's just SO nice to be able to go out to a bar or club and not have to wash your clothes afterward. Clearly NY is different than Columbus (or Cincinnati or Cleveland, for that matter), but I have seen NO decrease in bar patronage since the ban. I agree that it's a sign of a progressive city. So, that's my two cents.
June 12, 200520 yr the final spending tally came out today, no surprise: Smoke-free campaign outspent Columbus bar owners 6/12/2005, 12:48 p.m. ET The Associated Press COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — Anti-smoking activists outspent bar owners by more than $150,000 to help defeat a ballot initiative to exempt bars from the city's smoking ban, according to campaign finance reports. Fifty-six percent of voters last month rejected a proposal that would have amended the ban to allow smoking in establishments where alcohol accounts for 65 percent of sales. Citizens for Smoke Free Columbus, a coalition of political, civic and health leaders, spent $229,711 during the campaign. The group ran TV, radio and print ads, including some featuring breast-cancer survivor Stefanie Spielman, the wife of former Ohio State linebacker Chris Spielman. www.dispatch.com
June 12, 200520 yr I pray this spreads NORTH. God, I never thought I would ask for something in Columbus to be emulated in Cleveland! :evil: :-P :evil: I'm soft in my old age! :-o Living in NYC then coming home I hate going out due to the smoking aspect. As an asthmatic its unbearable. Currently, Cleveland has a lot of historical places/building that already ban smoking. And most restaurants/clubs in Cleveland have patios or outdoor seating so I think/hope that a "non smoking" ban would be placed into affect.
August 1, 200519 yr From the 8/1/05 Columbus Dispatch: Effect of smoking ban on bars mild so far Monday, August 01, 2005 Jodi Andes THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH When smoking disappeared from Columbus bars and restaurants, bar owners predicted their businesses would be next to go. But six months after Columbus’ indoor smoking ban took effect, only one restaurant has reported closing because it lost smoking patrons, say members of BarPAC, the Columbus Bar Owners Political Action Committee, which fought the ban. That restaurant, Julian’s Lounge, reopened last month. [email protected] http://www.dispatch.com/topstory.php?story=dispatch/2005/08/01/20050801-A1-02.html
August 2, 200519 yr well, i've been able to smoke in every bar i've been into in columbus since the ban went into place.....
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