First, there are a host of older restaurants that still allow smoking in their restaurants, and no guarantee that the ones who do not allow smoking now, will continue to do so. More important, there is no requirement that future restaurants in our growing town will prohibit smoking. And, without such smoking ordinances, one can be sitting in a patio area where no one is currently smoking, only to end up surrounded by smokers as the restaurant begins to fill up. Despite the reluctance of some to condone government involvement, such government involvement is inevitable. Surveys of Gilbert residents done during the course of working on the ordinance showed that 72 percent of the residents favored such an ordinance, and 81 percent expected the Town Council to act to protect them against the hazards of secondhand smoke.
People become much too impatient to let the market keep pace with their demands.
For those who oppose such ordinances, the important point to keep in mind is that we still have local control. In California, businesses years ago fought and lost the statewide smoking ban in restaurants. If cities continue to enact, in cooperation with businesses, such smoking ordinances, it is unlikely that Arizona will ever have to face statewide mandates. Such ordinances should therefore be seen not as anti-business but, like Gilbert's ordinance, very pro business in letting the businesses help to decide their own mandates. Marlene Pontrelli Maerowitz, a Gilbert resident, is a lawyer.