Tobacco.org

• Older smokes still on shelves 

Several area Indian smoke shops are selling cigarettes without a new kind of fire-safety paper required by legislation enacted last year, a Tulsa World investigation shows.

The World bought several packs of discount-brand cigarettes at smoke shops in Tulsa, Broken Arrow, Sapulpa and Beggs. A new state law requires cigarettes to be wrapped in fire-safe paper, beginning Jan. 1, 2009, said Paula Ross, spokeswoman for the Oklahoma Tax Commission.

To delay the law's effect, several area smoke shops appear to be selling old inventory bought before the law took effect about 10 months ago. The law allows retailers to sell old inventory until Jan. 1, 2010.

"Our plan for after January 1, 2010, is to contact the fire marshal's office if nonfire-safe cigarettes are found during a routine compliance check," Ross said.

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• $700,000 Monroe County Jury Award in Careless-Smoking Case  

A Monroe County jury has awarded $700,000 to the insurance company for the owner of a Marshalls Creek building that was destroyed by fire as a result of careless smoking by an employee of an electrical contractor, it was announced today.

The jury deliberated less than two hours at the end of a two-day trial before finding on behalf of Harleysville Insurance Company, represented by the Law Offices of Robert A. Stutman, of Ft. Washington, Pa, in the civil action stemming from the April 21, 2006, fire at the unoccupied building, a former Odd-Lot Outlet store, on Route 209 in Smithfield Township. The 20-year-old building, which was demolished following the fire, was in the process of being renovated into a day care center. Its owner was local developer Frank Riccobono.

Daniel Hogan, Esq., who tried the case for the plaintiff, established that the only possible cause of the fire was careless smoking by one of the two employees of the electrical contractor that had been working in the attic of the two-story structure. Investigators determined that the discarded, smoldering cigarette from the worker ignited the aged attic insulation, which over time loses fire-retardant qualities.

"The worker never admitted smoking while in the attic, where the fire started, that day," said Hogan. "But he testified to carrying cigarettes and a lighter to work and to having been a habitual smoker."

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• Wisconsin is next-to-last state to require fire-safe cigarettes  

Wisconsin has become the next-to-last state to require so-called fire-safe cigarettes.

Gov. Jim Doyle signed the bill a year-and-a-half ago and the law took effect on Oct. 1. . . .

Sen. Judy Robson, D-Beloit, tried for five years to require fire-safe cigarettes, soon after New York became the first state to mandate it.

Now, every state but Wyoming has similar laws on the books although some won’t actually take effect until next year or 2011.

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• Fire starter ordered not to smoke  

A man whose flicked cigarette started a fire that burned the roof of a Pukalani restaurant was ordered not to use tobacco for the next year as part of his sentence Friday.

"That means no cigarettes," 2nd Circuit Judge Joel August told 19-year-old Makaio Bachman-Majamay. "That certainly is related to the incident. Perhaps it will add about 10 or 15 years to his life if he stops smoking permanently."

The Makawao resident had pleaded no contest to third-degree criminal property damage, reduced from the original charge of third-degree arson, for the fire July 26, 2008, at Pukalani Terrace Center.

The fire was reported at 8:45 p.m. after Bachman-Majamay shared a cigarette with another man while sitting outside the Wei Wei Bar-B-Q Restaurant at Pukalani Terrace Center, officials reported. Bachman-Majamay reportedly flicked the cigarette onto the shake roof of the restaurant before walking into the Subway restaurant next door, where he was working.

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• Smoking laws tightened 

SMOKERS are set to have the number of places where they can light up freely curtailed even further, thanks to amended smoking laws.

Two new Acts, which amend the country’s tobacco control laws, are now in operation and according to the National Council Against Smoking, offer better protection for non- smokers.

“The Acts strengthen the existing law on smoking in public places; regulate the manufacture of tobacco products so as to make cigarettes less likely to start fires; and make them less appealing to children and less addictive,” said the council .

Smokers would no longer be able to smoke in “partially enclosed” public places, such as covered patios, verandas, balconies, walkways and parking areas, which could have serious implications for bars and restaurants.

Owners could now be fined a maximum of R50000 for breaking the smoking laws while the fine for the individual smoker is R500.

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• Smokers may face five days in jail ($$) 

Five days' detention for people who defy the smoking ban at indoor public places or fire-risk areas has been ordered by the Ministry of Public Security.

The move is part of a 50-day campaign to prepare a safe environment for the 60th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China on October 1.

The draconian detention measure in a country that boasts the world's largest smoking population became a talking point after a man caught smoking in a shopping mall in Chongqing was jailed for five days by police on Saturday.

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• Scotland is worst in UK for fire deaths and injuries  

SCOTLAND has the highest rate of fire deaths and injuries in the UK, it emerged yesterday, as figures showed a 13 per cent rise in fatalities.

There were 59 people killed in fires in 2007 – up from 52 the previous year, according to the official figures.

Roddy Robertson, of the Fire Brigades Union Scotland, said he believed socio-economic reasons were a major factor

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• Switch to fire-safe cigarettes delayed until 2011  

Although dozens of laws passed by Missouri lawmakers took effect at midnight Thursday, there's one law that will be delayed for a couple of years -- fire-safe cigarettes.

The measure, passed in the spring, requires cigarettes sold in the state to be near self-extinguishing.

To sell down existing stock, cigarette retailers and wholesalers will have until Jan. 1, 2011, to bring inventory in line with the new law, State Fire Marshall Randy Cole said.

Two fatalities resulted from cigarette-related fires in 2007 in Missouri, Cole said. Another seven were injured and $2.5 million in property damage resulted from cigarette fires the same year. No deaths could be directly attributed to cigarettes that failed to extinguish during the last three years in Boone County, said Gale Blomenkamp, Boone County Fire Protection District division chief. . . .

All states except Wyoming have adopted fire-safe cigarette laws, though 16 states, including Missouri, have delayed implementation until 2010 or 2011, according to the national Coalition for Fire-Safe Cigarettes.

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• Ecology Coatings Signs Development Agreement with Major U.S. Tobacco Company 

Ecology Coatings, Inc. (OTC Bulletin Board: ECOC), a leader in the discovery and development of nanotechnology-enabled, ultraviolet-curable advanced coatings, today announced that it has signed a collaboration agreement with a major tobacco company for the application of its technology for producing "fire standard compliant" (FSC) cigarettes. FSC cigarettes are designed to meet government reduced ignition propensity testing standards. Ecology has filed a patent application with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office for its technology.

The agreement establishes the framework under which the two companies plan to test and commercialize FSC cigarettes using Ecology Coatings' unique paper coating technology. Milestone payments will be made to Ecology Coatings as predefined development and testing milestones are met. If those payments are met, royalty payments will commence with market introduction and product sales.

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• CONSTRUX SITES STILL SMOKIN'  

New York construction sites are smokin' hot -- and that's bad.

A nearly yearlong crackdown on smoking at construction sites around the city by the Buildings Department has resulted in almost 1,000 violations being issued and $1.8 million in fines, The Post has learned.

The butt blitz -- the first time the department has cited contractors for smoking violations -- began last Sept. 6. It was spurred by the 2007 deaths of two firefighters in a cigarette-sparked blaze at the troubled Deutsche Bank demolition site near Ground Zero.

"It's a disgrace that people continue to smoke on construction sites," said Buildings Commissioner Robert LiMandri. "Smoking is prohibited on construction sites for a reason -- because it puts lives at serious risk."

"Our inspectors will continue to enforce the smoking ban because the industry has got to change."

As of last Wednesday, LiMandri's inspectors had issued 932 violations . . .

The most-cited site -- with nine smoking-related violations -- was the ongoing construction of the 57-story W hotel/condo building at 123 Washington St. That's right across the street from the Deutsche Bank site, where firefighters Joseph Graffagnino and Robert Beddia were killed on April 18, 2007.

The Post recently was told that FDNY officials suspect that a cigar butt found at the Deutsche Bank site at 130 Liberty St. on June 10 -- which led to a violation being issued to the contractor, Bovis -- actually fell or was tossed from the W site.

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• Fire-safe cigarettes have smokers doing a slow burn  

And with little hoopla, every state but Wyoming has passed laws that mandate fire-safe cigarettes.

In Kansas, fire-safe cigarettes have been the law since July 1. In Missouri, the most recent state to adopt the standard, the law takes effect in September 2010.

Fire-safe cigarettes are sold on both sides of the state line. They can be identified by the small initials "FSC" on the packs.

But as fire-safe cigarettes have spread nationwide, complaints from smokers have followed. An online petition calling for the repeal of fire-safe cigarette laws now has more than 7,000 signatures.

Smokers from across the country fill Internet sites with complaints about headaches, coughing fits, nausea and other maladies they attribute to the new cigarettes.

They point to a 2005 study from the Harvard School of Public Health that found the smoke from fire-safe cigarettes contained on average 11 percent more carbon monoxide and 14 percent more naphthalene -- the ingredient in mothballs -- than conventional cigarettes. The Harvard researchers consider the differences negligible, however.

Discontented smokers also claim the new cigarettes are laced with more chemical additives, most notably ethylene vinyl acetate, an adhesive used to glue cigarettes together.

"They're horrible. I've been waking up with headaches, body aches, coughing like I'm hacking up a lung," said Jamie Bartlett, 21, of Grandview. "I just thought I was getting sick until someone pointed (the fire-safe cigarettes) out to me."

The new cigarettes have no additional ethylene vinyl acetate or other chemicals, said David Sutton, a spokesman for Philip Morris USA.

"We don't add any other ingredients not found in traditional cigarette manufacturing," Sutton said. "They're just like traditional cigarettes." . . .

Philip Morris plans to phase out conventional cigarettes by the first half of next year. R.J. Reynolds cigarettes could all be fire-safe by the end of this year.

But it may take years before we see the full effect of the new cigarettes on fire deaths.

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• Housing Authority to prohibit smoking  

The Housing Authority of Murray recently adopted a policy that will ban residents from smoking inside their apartments.

Faye Dodd, the agency's executive director, said they had considered making the units non-smoking for a few months partly because the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development has been encouraging housing authorities to adopt non-smoking policies. She said 112 housing authorities across the country are currently smoke-free.

However, she said the issue became more urgent in May after a resident fell asleep while smoking and the apartment burned down. Dodd said the Housing Authority is still working out the details with its insurance company, but that the building will most likely have to be torn down and rebuilt.

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• Subject: Non-Smoking Policies in Public Housing  

1. Purpose. This notice strongly encourages Public Housing Authorities (PHAs) to implement non-smoking policies in some or all of their public housing units. According to the American Lung Association, cigarette smoking is the number one cause of preventable disease in the United States. The elderly and young populations, as well as people with chronic illnesses, are especially vulnerable to the adverse effects of smoking. This concern was recently addressed by the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act, P.L. 111-31, signed by the President on June 22, 2009. Because Environmental Tobacco Smoke (ETS) can migrate between units in multifamily housing, causing respiratory illness, heart disease, cancer, and other adverse health effects in neighboring families, the Department is encouraging PHAs to adopt non-smoking policies. By reducing the public health risks associated with tobacco use, this notice will enhance the effectiveness of the Department’s efforts to provide increased public health protection for residents of public housing. Smoking is also an important source of fires and fire-related deaths and injuries. Currently, there is no Departmental guidance on smoking in public housing. . . .

Based on data from the U.S. Fire Administration(USFA) of the Department of Homeland Security, there were an estimated 18,700 smoking-material fires in homes in 2006. These fires caused 700 civilian deaths (other than firefighters’), and 1,320 civilian injuries, and $496 million in direct property damage. In multifamily buildings, smoking is the leading cause of fire deaths: 26 percent of fire deaths in 2005

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• West County firefighters put out the (cigarette) smoke  

Fire officials in west St. Louis County want to make sure all that's smoking are the fires.

In what's thought to be the most aggressive anti-smoking policy among fire departments in the state, firefighters and other employees of the West County EMS and Fire Protection District won't be allowed to smoke on the job or in uniform starting in January.

Also, all employees hired after Jan. 1 must agree not to smoke or chew tobacco while on- or off-duty.

"The spirit of the policy is not to get anybody in trouble," district spokeswoman Kim Bacon said. "Everybody knows it's in their best interest." . . .

Minda said he was surprised by the positive reaction among firefighters. The union's vote to approve the policy was unanimous.

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• Improper discarding of smoking materials can lead to fire 

Recently two of Naval Support Activity (NSA) North Potomac's installations have experienced fires with all signs leading to the improper discarding of smoking materials. These smoking materials were discarded near plants and mulched areas either from people smoking in non-smoking areas, or from being discarded from moving vehicles. As a result of theses actions the recent fires have resulted in property loss on the installations. . . .

In an attempt to eliminate these types of incidents in the future, the Naval District Washington (NDW) Fire Prevention Division would like to remind everyone of the current NDW Instruction 5100.2C. This document defines the policy for smoking and tobacco use for NDW and all tenant command activities located onboard installations under the regional jurisdiction.

In accordance with this document, the described policies are applicable to all Department of Defense, military personnel, civilian employees (including non-appropriated fund employees), contract personnel, military families and visitors.

The instruction states that smoking is not allowed in any government vehicles, buildings or garages. Also, smoking is not permitted in any common areas. Smoking is only allowed in ''Designated smoking areas" which are identified by signs and tobacco receptacles. Employees should make themselves aware of these areas and be sure to use them.

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