Council Kills Second Effort to Ban Restaurant Smoking : Tobacco: City attorney’s office is ordered to draft a compromise measure that would provide more tables for nonsmokers. Critics say it preserves the status quo.
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As baguette-wielding restaurant workers looked on, a proposal to ban smoking in Los Angeles eateries went down in flames Tuesday for the second time in a little more than year.
The Los Angeles City Council, under heavy pressure from the tobacco and restaurant industries, instead voted 8 to 7 to ask the city attorney’s office to draft a compromise measure derided by critics as a “dressed up status quo.” The plan allows each restaurant to designate itself smoking or nonsmoking.
Each establishment would have to post a sign indicating its smoking status. Those that allowed smoking would have to reserve 60% of their tables for nonsmokers--an increase from the 50% nonsmoking minimum now mandated.
The measure, which could become law this summer if approved by the full City Council, also would require that the area reserved for nonsmokers be enlarged to 70% by July, 1994.
City Councilman Joel Wachs, who authored the compromise, said his measure was designed to “give everyone a choice.”
“It will give those restaurants which choose to be nonsmoking the right to do so,” Wachs said. “It will give those restaurants which want to satisfy a limited area for smokers a right to do so--and everyone will be given a notice beforehand so they can make an informed choice.”
Crusading anti-smoker Councilman Marvin Braude, who proposed the total ban, blamed the defeat of his measure on intense pressure from tobacco industry lobbyists and restaurateurs led by chef-to-the-stars Wolfgang Puck and the 3,000-member California Restaurant Assn.
The restaurateurs contended that a ban could drive customers to neighboring cities, reduce business and create a loss of jobs.
“Let us not succumb to the pressures of the tobacco industry,” Braude argued before the full council as hundreds of opponents booed and hissed. “The eyes of the United States are on us. Let Los Angeles be the city that won the battle for health.”
The City Council deadlocked 6 to 6 on a similar ban proposal in October, 1990.
Records show that tobacco industry donations to Mayor Tom Bradley and council members between 1984 and 1990 totaled $13,150.
A report issued by the city Ethics Commission on March 6 said the Tobacco Institute, an industry trade group, paid $45,000 in fees to four lobbyists in the last three months of 1991--making it one of the most active special-interest groups at City Hall.
Two other lobbyists, Alma Fitch and Clark Davis of Fitch/Davis Associates, were each paid $52,600 by the Phillip Morris Co. last year, according to earnings reports submitted to the Ethics Commission.
In 1990, Fitch and Davis each received $57,350 from Phillip Morris, Ethics Commission documents showed.
On Tuesday, Davis was among at least six lobbyists in City Hall trying to persuade council members not to legislate smoking out of existence in Los Angeles restaurants.
“We’re saying if it ain’t broke don’t fix it,” Davis said in an interview. “Everything’s working fine the way things are now.”
A majority of the council agreed. Voting in favor of the compromise were Wachs, Ernani Bernardi, Nate Holden, Hal Bernson, Michael Woo, Richard Alatorre, Joan Milke Flores and Council President John Ferraro.
Opposing Wachs’ measure were Braude, Mike Hernandez, Ruth Galanter, Zev Yaroslavsky, Rita Walters, Mark Ridley-Thomas and Joy Picus.
The council’s action followed 90 minutes of often emotional testimony from doctors, restaurant owners, business leaders and employees--many of whom wore large yellow badges on their lapels that said “Save Our Restaurants.”
Also on hand were 20 employees of Hotel Sofitel/Ma Maison dressed in white T-shirts who waved baguettes and chanted, “Don’t take our bread away!”
Among those speaking in favor of a complete ban was Dr. Paul Papanek of the American Lung Assn., who said smoking accounts for “10,000 deaths per year in Los Angeles--and sidestream smoke accounts for 5% to 10% of that mortality.”
Patrick Reynolds, grandson of tobacco tycoon R. J. Reynolds and an anti-smoking crusader, warned that the city’s “liability for damages caused by secondhand smoke is substantial.”
“The restaurants are playing into the hands of the tobacco industry and harming themselves in the process,” Reynolds said. “The ban is really their ally.”
Frank Holoman, owner of the Boulevard Cafe in South-Central Los Angeles, was among several restaurateurs who believe a ban on smoking would cut sales by as much as 30% and sink eating places that are struggling to stay in business in tough economic times.
“You’re dealing with our lives and the lives of our restaurants,” Holoman said as hundreds of supporters applauded. “You’re going to be responsible for minority people being out of work.”
Braude, however, noted that a 35-page study released this week by the city’s chief legislative analyst concluded that banning tobacco would have little or no impact on sales or the city’s tax receipts.
The analyst’s conclusions, which were based on a review of economic studies, showed that “any effect on public sector revenues or private business activities may well be negligible.”
Braude also referred to stacks of medical reports on his desk showing that sidestream smoke contains 43 known carcinogens and kills 50,000 people a year nationwide.
Yaroslavsky agreed that more was at stake than profit margins for financially ailing restaurants.
“This is not a matter of choice or personal freedom--this is a matter of health,” said Yaroslavsky, formerly a two-pack-a-day smoker. “It is not right for you to have to inhale somebody else’s unhealthy habit.”
After the debate, Braude held a news conference to declare that the fight was far from over.
“We’ll bring the motion back as soon as we can,” said Braude, who hopes to make Los Angeles the first large city in the nation to ban smoking in eating places. “Next time we’ll get eight votes.”
Times researcher Cecilia Rasmussen contributed to this story.
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