By Nathan Ryder - bio | email | Twitter
Posted by Sarah Harlan - email
EVANSVILLE, IN (WFIE) - A tie-vote Monday night came after the council heard impassioned arguments for and against the smoking ban proposal.
Monday night's challenge, at least for two city council members, was the special exemptions that allowed smoking to continue at places like Casino Aztar, private clubs and tobacco shops.
Once at capacity inside the Evansville City Council chambers, a large crowd looking to voice their opinions about a stricter smoking ban spilled out into the hallway of the Civic Center Monday night.
Public comment took more than an hour, ranging from worker's rights to the economic impacts on local businesses.
"Business owners do not have the right to expose patrons or workers to second-hand smoke anymore than they have the right to disobey sanitation guidelines or ignore fire codes for seating capacity," one Evansville resident said.
"It's a free country," one Evansville resident said. "You have a choice if you want to work there or not. When people put in an application to work at a restaurant, bar or tavern or whatever, they know that it is a smoking establishment."
"When businesses allow smoking in their place of business, they are discriminating against a whole class of people and those are people with breathing problems," Charles Hughlet, who supports the smoking ban, said.
"We're probably going to have to re-think our hours of business and we will probably end up laying off a bartender or two," David Mosby, who is against the smoking ban, said.
The stricter smoking ordinance failed after a split vote: 4-council members voting yes, 4-voting no.
For Councilman John Friend, his no vote was mainly a result of special exemptions which he thinks are hypocritical.
"When you enact a law, generally it usually stays a bad law," Friend said. "I never see them coming back and changing those things, so let's get it right."
Other council members were disappointed with the outcome.
"I was disappointed that it did not pass, however everybody has the right to vote their own conscience and that's what I did tonight," Evansville City Council member Constance Robinson said.
"A lot of work went into this but this isn't over," Evansville City Council member Dan Adams, Ph.D., said. "We're going to keep trying and maybe next year."
So, the big question is: will this smoking ban come back around again without all the exemptions?
There seems to be some indication that it might.
Even though it seems like a ban might be a shoe-in at that point, it still could fail.
City Councilman Curt John was not at Monday night's meeting and he could tip the majority against a ban.
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