[C-U Smokefree] We must adopt a smoke-free ordinace for Champaign and Urbana

[carlisle at soltec.net]

Dear Mayor Schweighart and Champaign City Council:

It is imperative that the Chanmpaign City Council adopt an ordinance banning
smoking in most public places.  Secondhand smoke is dangerous not only to
smokers but to non-smokers. Many of them have respiratory illnesses that make
breathing unpleasant or even difficult for them. Evidence has been shown that
some kind of cancers can form in non-smokers from breathing someone else's
smoke.

Since the air is for everyone to breathe, it is important that non-smokers
have the chance to breathe unpolluted air in public places, such as bars and
restaurants, that they patronize and frequent.

I had smoked a pipe for over 30 years and am developing some bronchitis from
breathing others' cigarette smoke. I never liked cigarette smoke, that it is
harsh and irritating.  It stinks and makes people and their clothing smell
unpleasant.  Some people sound like sandpaper when they talk, from the damage
smoking has done on their larynxes.  They are often coughing and wheezing from
smoke.

I had been fed "static" myself about pungent Latakia pipe tobacco, that it
smelled like creosote or manure to others.

I quit cigars long ago, due to their increasing costs.  I would support tax
increases on all forms of tobacco to discourage their use, especially pipe
tobacco, long overdue for a tax increase..

Even when Blind Pig had a smoke-free day on Tuesdays, the smell lingered in
the place. It smelled like the tan bark on floor of the Stock Pavilion.  The
places where smoking occurs have filth. The grillwork of the former Elite
Diner in Urbana was always dirty with a greasy haze about it from smoking. I
rememner the smell lingering in motel rooms.

Since carle Foundation Hospital bans smoking anywhere on its premises,
employees cross the street in Crystal Lake Park to smoke. Cigharette but cans
from coffee cans on the picnic tables are an eyesore and a "nose-sore!"  it
looks bad to see these people puffing away.

Smoking is so foul and costly. The estimated impact cost is around $11.35 per
pack, and all of us are paying the difference between that cost and the price
per pack, in higher insurance premiums and costs of losses of productivity
from workers ill from smoking.  The cost is simply too great.

We msut rid of this costly and unpleasant nuisance now.  I urge you to pass
ordinance banning smoking form Public Places.

George R. Carlisle, Jr.
406 East Green, 102
Urbana, IL  61802

217-367-2506

carlisle at soltec.net