Cedar Rapids smoking ban in parks takes step ahead

CEDAR RAPIDS - On a 9-0 vote, the city's Parks, Waterways and Recreation Commission on Tuesday recommended that the City Council ban the use of tobacco, nicotine and electronic vaporizers from city parks, trails and recreational venues, including the city's four golf courses.

The commission has discussed the ban for a few months as it has followed a similar discussion next door in Marion, where its Park Board recommended a similar ban and the City Council approved it earlier this month.

In a final change to the proposed Cedar Rapids ordinance that it approved Tuesday, the commission recommended violators be subject to a ticket with a $50 fine, so that each violation didn't end up in court with the potential to take up police officer time.

The draft ordinance had called for a fine of up to a $100, with the possibility of jail time.

'A lever, not a hammer,” said commission member Don Clow, who favored the lesser penalty.

The matter now will go to the City Council's Public Safety and Youth Services Committee and, if approved there, on to the full council.

After Tuesday's commission meeting, Chairwoman Jackie Thompson-Oster said the commission spent little time at previous meetings in debate about how a ban would affect the civil liberties of smokers.

The commission did talk about the impact to golfers who like to smoke cigars as they play, but no one fought for an exception for them, Thompson-Oster said.

She said the commission concluded that smokers adjusted to the prohibition against smoking in bars and restaurants, and they will adjust to a similar ban in parks, on trails and at recreational venues, too.

'It's a cultural change, and until you get an ordinance, you're not going to change the culture,” she said.

She said the city's Blue Zones project and the Area Substance Abuse Council both encouraged the commission to approve the smoking ban.

Thompson-Oster said she has found it annoying to be sitting at a baseball or softball game and having to endure smoke from the stands nearby.

She said the new ordinance, if passed by City Council, will make residents more likely to point out to someone smoking, in violation of the ban, that city law does not permit the practice.

'You don't have to be nasty and confrontational about it,” she said.

Thompson-Oster said she rides her bicycle on the Cedar River Trail where some walk or bike and smoke, sometimes tossing cigarette butts along the way.

The smoking and the litter left behind can harm children and wildlife, she said.

A survey conducted by the Area Substance Abuse Council in November 2014 found that eight of 10 survey participants did not believe tax dollars should be used to clean up litter in parks left by smokers, the city said.