Vehicle smoking ban proposed
By Lauren Radomski
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Smoking in vehicles where children are present would be prohibited under a bill heard by the House Health Care and Human Services Policy and Oversight Committee March 17.
Rep. Nora Slawik (DFL-Maplewood) sponsors
HF379, which would allow peace officers to issue citations for the offense only if a vehicle is stopped for another violation. Slawik said she does not intend to move her bill through the committee process or add it to other legislation this year.
“The time will come — we’re probably not there yet,” she said.
Secondhand smoke in vehicles is particularly harmful to children because their breathing rates are faster and their developing lungs take in more toxins, said Natalie Johnson Lee, executive director of the Minnesota African/African-American Tobacco Education Network. Black children have significantly higher rates of asthma and other smoking-related conditions compared to other children, she said.
Other bill proponents, including 13-year-old Joe Chlebeck, encouraged legislators to protect young children who cannot speak for themselves. He compared riding in a smoke-filled vehicle to “being in prison and a gas chamber.”
Tobacco use is the state’s top public health problem, said Dr. Edward Ehlinger, a pediatrician and president of the Twin Cities Medical Society. Patient education is part of the solution, he said, but public policies are especially effective.
“This bill would help establish and solidify the norm that exposure to secondhand smoke is a significant public health risk,” Ehlinger said. “It would help teach children that we all have some responsibility to help protect the health of others.”
No one spoke against the bill, though Rep. Laura Brod (R-New Prague) said future opposition could come from people who feel the legislation encroaches on private property rights.
A companion,
SF359, sponsored by Sen. Sandy Pappas (DFL-St. Paul), awaits action by the Senate Health and Human Services Budget Division.
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