Calif. County Could Ban Smoking in Condos, Apartments

Santa Clara County supervisors on Nov. 9 are expected to consider final approval of a law that would help make its tobacco control measures among the nation’s toughest by banning smoking in apartment and condominium units.

The Mercury News reported Oct. 25 that county officials are responding to mounting evidence that secondhand smoke poses serious dangers to nonsmokers, and that nonsmokers living in residential communities where others smoke are particularly susceptible.

The proposed law elicited little formal opposition when supervisors first took up the matter last month, although the newspaper reported that some smokers who live in condominium or apartment complexes consider the proposal an infringement on individual rights.

The proposed law on residences would prohibit smoking in all apartment, condominium and townhouse units, as well as in common-use areas of the complexes. Apartment owners are not opposing the proposal because they were able to achieve a compromise in language that results in placing liability on the smoker, not the complex owner.

A study published in the journal Nicotine & Tobacco Research adds momentum to efforts to limit apartment dwellers' exposure to tobacco smoke. HealthDay reported Oct. 21 that researchers at Roswell Park Cancer Center looked at air quality data from sites in 11 apartment buildings and concluded that secondhand smoke can travel from smokers' apartments into the units of nonsmokers.