Local businesses grapple with new smoke-free law.
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Will Adams takes a long, hard pull from a Winston Light cigarette and sucks the ensuing cloud of smoke deep into his lungs.
"There's been a lot of confusion about it all," Adams, co-owner of WilLee's Blues Club on Guadalupe Street, says quickly, before taking another drag. "I've gotten a lot of calls from business owners wondering what was going on and how the ordinance affects them."
The ordinance in question is the recently passed law that prohibits smoking in virtually all businesses within Santa Fe City limits. The Smoke-Free Ordinance, which went into effect June 30, also prevents patrons from lighting up on outdoor patios and within 25 feet of the entrance of any business.
Maligned by smokers, lauded by non-smokers, the ordinance has been the talk of the town of late. But the ordinance's complexities also have been an increasing source of confusion for some local business owners who say the city has provided minimal information on its specifics.
City officials say they're waiting on thousands of signs and information packets from a coalition of anti-tobacco groups that will be available for businesses after July 15.
That's not soon enough for Adams-whose club is known for its cigarette-puffing, whiskey-swilling clientele-who was out of town when the ordinance was passed by the city in May. Even after making a barrage of phone calls to the city and sending a letter to Mayor David Coss, Adams says he received no information on the law until a postcard arrived in the mail from the city two days after the law hit the books.
"It's seems dumb to pass the law and then not tell us how to execute it," Adams, who opposes the ordinance, says.
Much of the hand wringing on the part of business owners, Adams says, revolves around questions of where smokers can actually light up once outside a particular establishment. In the case of WilLee's, Adams is allowing patrons to smoke in a section of an outdoor patio because the patio is technically part of Fatso's, a take-out pizza and pasta joint that operates from the same building. Adams says he consulted with the city on the patio issue and decided that since the
back portion of the patio is more than
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25 feet away from WilLee's and Fatso's, smoking is permissible.
Jennifer Hoback, co-owner of the Dragon Room Bar on Old Santa Fe Trail, says she didn't even receive the courtesy postcard Adams got. As a result, she didn't know when the ordinance went into effect and continued to let customers smoke in her bar until July 1.
Hoback adds that during the week of July 2, the Dragon Room received a warning from the city because someone complained about smoking in or around the bar, a complaint she surmises originated from the extra night of smoking the bar mistakenly allowed.
"We heard absolutely nothing from the city and still haven't," Hoback, a supporter of the ordinance, says. "Not a single letter, not a single phone call. Nothing to follow up with the businesses. I am disappointed with the lack of information. It's very discouraging."
Sarah Wilhelm, owner of the Aztec Café on Aztec Street, says that she too received no word from the city. Wilhelm posted her own no-smoking sign after a friend gave her a copy of the ordinance.
"It's disconcerting," she says. "There's not much information available. The only thing I've found have been a few newspaper articles."
Sevastián Gurulé, the city's constituent services manager, says postcards were mailed to 5,300 registered Santa Fe businesses and the city also disseminated four press releases, held a press conference and a series of public hearings on the matter. All of this information, coupled with a city hotline on the ordinance, is enough to spread the gospel, he says. Still, Gurulé concedes that it would have been ideal to get the 7,000 packets and signs, courtesy of a coalition of national and local anti-tobacco groups, out to businesses before the law went into effect.
In the meantime, Gurulé's phone, and the city's smoke-free ordinance hot line, have been flooded with calls requesting information. Those calls include complaints about businesses allegedly operating in violation of the ordinance, particularly WilLee's and the Green Onion, Gurulé says.
"We're working with WilLee's on the patio issue," Gurulé says. "We're going to go out to the site and see what options are available to them."
Management at the Green Onion could not be reached for comment.
As for future complaints, Gurulé says the city's two-person inspections code enforcement section is considering hiring three additional officers to help monitor compliance of the law throughout Santa Fe.
"We're looking into the financial aspects of having these officers work a staggered schedule so some of them can go out in the evening hours too," he says.
But City Attorney Frank Katz tells SFR that he sees good Samaritans, presumably non-smoking ones, as the real shepherds of the law.
"The smoking ordinance is going to be largely enforced by people who don't like smoke. If somebody lights up in an inappropriate place, it's likely that other people will go to the management and complain about it," Katz says.
Fines for violating the ordinance, for both patrons and businesses, range from up to $100 for a first offense to $500 for multiple offenses, depending on whom the city deems responsible for breaking the law.
Adams, who originally contemplated taking the city to court over the ordinance, says it's too late for legal action. But he would like to see the patio and 25-foot buffer portion of the ordinance changed so the law is easier for businesses to handle. Adams says he's spoken with other businesses about approaching city councilors on the issue.
"Is it really safer for the public to have a group of drunk guys from my bar more than 25 feet away just to smoke? That's how brawls happen," Adams says, between final puffs on his cigarette. "The way it stands now, the law is just confusing."
