Smoking Ban Vote Delay?
After nearly 200 people turned out for public comment on Thursday, the decision on the Monongalia County Clean Indoor Air Regulation has been delayed. As with many of the conversations we Reds have had on the subject, the debate voiced on the WBOY-TV 12 website is a clash between individual rights, the choices of adults, and the measurable health risk.
The Board of Health received over 3000 comments according to WBOY: 1, 441 for the ban and 2,137 against the ban.
Bar and lottery owners have proposed a counter to the regulation, allowing smoking in 18+ establishments, which the Board of Health will be reviewing at a meeting next week. They do not anticipate considering the smoking ban again until their next regular meeting, which may be in May.
Posted by Erin | Mar 28th, 2008 | in Food & Health, Local News
Other posts you may enjoy:
- Monongalia County Smoking Ban Delayed Indefinitely
- Mon County Board of Health Meets Thursday
- Smoking Ban in Morgantown?
- Clarksburg Water Board Customers Should Boil Their Water
- Elkins Cat License
When a community stands as one, tyrants never stand a chance.
I really wish that same community would take more notice at home in the unrestricted power of “Public Health Authority” which means the same in the post health care reforms era, as it mean when Hitler used it to gain power and legality in all that he would do. The abandon of the search for cures in favor of “disease management” [AKA their are no accidents], is an issue not well known or understood in the public, a campaign designed to protect industrial interests from responsibility for what ever they do to us.
In example the Tobacco Industry was allowed to double the settlement known as MSA in the United States and pass the total along to the consumer making a 300 billion dollar profit as their share of being punished. Is it any wonder the largest polluters on the planet are lining up demanding their punishments for the Global warming scam. WE no longer support an admonishment of the Tobacco Industry but now are encouraged to hate their victims instead. Recent calls to minimize parental authority in a “guilt until proven innocent” stance, we now see a call across the country for smoking bans in cars. Making use of emotional blackmail to coerce punishing and targeted legislation. This is not a move to protect children, when the experts agree casual exposures to the smoke is not a large concern. This is a law which reinforces a stereotype and minimizes property rights in the dehumanization of smokers, a planned exercise described openly at Health Canada’s website.
[Search Social Marketing and compare that description with the definition of propaganda. look further and search for "Cultivation Theory" and you can start to see the pictures being painted in our evening news]
Today the same organized and partnered groups, announced their next target will be raising the drinking age to 21 and the continued effort to make people with a weight problem feel ashamed of themselves. Unchecked this movement amounts to no less than the promotion of hatred and divisions when clearly understanding and empathy is required. The World Health Organization in partnership with Industry and reprehensibly “the Galton Institute” as a major contributor, has developed a process to undermine elected authority, they call it “HIA Health Intervention” a process which connects all human activity to health effect and demonstrates a cost to society. An enabler of micro management by the investing stakeholders which is so paralleled to the writings of Dr. Robert Proctor, and the process he described, we would be ignorant to not recognize what is truly being supported by public health advocacy.
Did we forget so soon?
I am in complete agreement that our local health boards have been abusing their authority. With smoking bans they have moved beyond their assumed areas of expertise and gone into areas where they should not be concerned. They are in essence limiting the use of a legal substance. They are also limiting a persons use of their own private property. Local health boards were never intended to do that. By doing so they are degrading the rights of all Americans.
Smoking may be the issue now but but the do gooders have already started on obesity as their next target. What will be next? The average citizen doesn’t realize that their local health boards have nearly limitless power. Virtually any activity can be declared a health hazard and can be restricted or banned by any local health board with little or no expertise on the subject. These local health boards have no fear of retribution because nearly all are appointed and not voted for by the general public.
I was a proud business owner for more then twenty five years. My business was profitable and everything was fine. Then our local health department decided a smoking ban was in order. I fought it not because I smoked but because I felt that they were eroding my rights as a business owner. It was my money invested in my business as well as my time and toil. I didn’t feel they should have the right to come in and tell me that my customers couldn’t do a legal activity within my establishment. They listened very nicely then went out and did precisely what they wanted. As an American citizen, I had no say. As a business owner, I had no say. As a respected comunity leader, I had no say. I began feeling like a Jew in 1939 Germany. I had no say in my future and no rights
The smoking ban was enacted without any concern for what the public wanted. The presumed good it was going to do for the public health was to far outweigh the the minor inconvience it might cause to the businessman. I was told not to be concerned because their studies proved that my business would actually pick up when the hoardes of non smokers started filling my establishment. My business dropped by 20% the first month. It dropped even lower the next month and continued dropping. In eight months, my revenue was down nearly $200,000.00. I closed the doors and sold the business to some unsuspecting person at a loss. That person lasted less then a year and the establishment has remained closed ever since.
Am I bitter? You bet I am. The financial loss was disturbing but what is most disturbing is that something like this can happen in America. A spokesman for the health board said that the closing of my establishment was “Unfortunate”. The loss of my rights as a citizen and property owner weren’t even mentioned