Nov. 7, 2006 was a historic day for public health at the ballot box.  Voters in three states and eight communities voiced their support of smoke-free air legislation; another three states passed tobacco excise tax increases.  Specifically:

• In Arizona, Prop 201 passed by 54.2 percent making all workplaces and public places 100% smoke free.

• In Ohio, Issue #5 passed by 58.3 percent, guaranteeing a strong statewide smoke-free law in Ohio. 

• In Nevada, the Nevada Clean Indoor Air Act (Question 5) passed by 53.9 percent, making most workplaces smoke free (excludes stand-alone bars and casinos). The Nevada law also restores local control to allow cities and towns to strengthen the state law at the local level.

• Voters in Appleton, Wisc., and Mankato, Minn., successfully upheld smoke-free laws that were passed by the local government and referred to the ballot by smoke-free opponents.

• Voters in Abilene, Texas, and Nixa, Mo., overwhelmingly approved non-binding referenda in support of their City Councils adopting smoke-free workplace laws.

• Voters in Baytown, Texas; Lee’s Summit, Mo.; and Independence, Mo., approved strong smoke-free laws.

• Lexington, Neb., voters successfully rejected a weak ordinance that would have allowed business to have ventilated smoking rooms, which do not protect people from secondhand smoke exposure.

• Florida voters approved a measure to require that tobacco settlement money be used to fund tobacco prevention programs; voters in South Dakota approved a measure to increase tobacco taxes and fund tobacco prevention and other health care programs; and in Arizona, voters approved an increase in tobacco taxes to fund early childhood development programs. 

There were a few disappointments as well – notably the failure of tobacco excise tax increases in California and Missouri.  These campaigns for smoke-free air were not without roadblocks from Big Tobacco. Industry giants R. J. Reynolds and Philip Morris (Altria) poured millions of dollars into opposing California’s Proposition 86, which would have raised the tobacco tax an additional $2.75 and earmarked the increase for health care and tobacco prevention and cessation programs.  Missouri's Amendment 3 would have added 80 cents to the 17-cent tax on a pack of cigarettes and tripled the tax on other tobacco products. It lost by 61,764 votes out of more than 2 million cast.  In the only smoke-free election loss, voters in Kirkwood, Mo., rejected a smoke-free law, 55 percent to 45 percent.

As a result of the elections and the passage of smoke-free laws in city council chambers and state capitals, more than 50 percent of the U.S. population is protected from exposure to secondhand smoke by a local or state smoke-free law, according to data from the American Nonsmokers’ Rights Foundation.  This figure will continue to climb this year as other local and state smoke-free laws go into effect throughout 2007.  Additionally, our colleagues around the globe continue to enact smoke-free regulations, bringing us closer to not simply a smoke-free society, but a smoke-free world.

Cynthia Hallett, MPH