Jump to full article: Columbus (OH) Dispatch, 2009-09-24
Author: James Nash THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH DispatchPolitics
Intro: Ohio is poised to reduce its spending on anti-tobacco programs from $40 million a year early this decade to nothing by the beginning of the next decade, anti-tobacco activists said yesterday while calling for cigarette taxes to be applied to other tobacco products.
Last year, state leaders dissolved a $264 million fund stocked with money from a multistate settlement with tobacco companies reached a decade earlier. At the same time, Gov. Ted Strickland's administration set aside a fraction of the money -- $6 million this year -- for the Ohio Department of Health to continue running some of the anti-smoking programs the foundation administered.
The programs include a toll-free quit line, grants to local groups and an annual survey regarding tobacco use.
Most of the foundation's money was redesignated for social services, although a Franklin County judge last month blocked the diversion. The state is appealing the ruling.
A coalition of anti-smoking activists called Investing in Tobacco-Free Youth held a news conference at the Statehouse yesterday to decry the loss of funding.
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