Wednesday, November 12, 2003
|
Wednesday, November 12, 2003 |
|
Anti-smoking activist urges county: Ban all public smoking By JOHN THOMPSON The Fayette County Commission got an earful last week about imposing a smoking ban in public places. “Secondhand smoke has destroyed my quality of life,” said resident Kathie Cheney at the end of last weeks’ County Commission meeting. With a quivering voice and grasping a water bottle, Cheney explained she didn’t know the effects of secondhand smoke, because you really can’t see what it’s doing to your body. She told the commission that Peachtree City’s smoking ordinance provides signs on doors indicating the level of smoke in the facility, but nobody has really done anything to eradicate the dangers of the smoke in areas where it’s present. “It’s time to quit the sleight-of hand games,” she said. Secondhand smoke has destroyed Cheney’s life, and left her with a case of throat cancer, despite her otherwise perfect health, she said. “My cholesterol’s perfect and I had no symptoms,” she said. Commission Chairman Greg Dunn sympathized with Cheney, and said he avoided going into any establishment where smoke was present, because he grew up with asthma. He said the county was carefully studying the idea, and said the resolution was pretty open-ended when it was presented to the county. “It said eliminate smoking in public places, but it didn’t specify what a public place was,” he said. During the next few weeks, the county plans to study the resolution and determine if there is a way to address the problem. “We’re seriously trying to address the issue. But if we do something, we want to make sure it can be reasonably enforced,” he said.
|
||