The Joplin Globe, Joplin, MO

Enjoy

Related Photos

  • Dave Woods, Globe New Media Editor

    images_sizedimage_051085703

Discussion

August 27, 2010

Dave Woods, The Booze Beat: Smoking bans not popular with bar patron?

By Dave Woods New media and marketing manager

JOPLIN, Mo. — The effort to ban smoking in bars and restaurants — any indoor space, for that matter — is heating up in Southwest Missouri.

The Webb City council on Monday night voted to take a closer look at the issue and have a proposed ordinance drafted, which would ban smoking in public places. The local group pushing the issue, The Clean Air Project, is looking for support for the smoke-free idea and has approached other city governments, as well.

Joplin officials will hold a public hearing this fall to take the public’s temperature and the Carl Junction Chamber of Commerce has taken a poll of residents to see where they stand on the subject.

I don’t really have a dog in this fight. I smoked cigarettes during my Navy years and was in the last boot camp company in Orlando, Fla., where smoking was allowed.

Generic menthols at $2 a carton on base and my ship were my cig of choice. I never really had the urge to smoke before I signed up for Uncle Sam’s service, but in order to get a break from the daily grind of boot camp, you had to be quick to react when the company commander yelled, “Smoke ‘em if ya got ‘em.”

‘Bad for bar business’

Earlier this week I decided to head out and see what some folks in Joplin think about going smoke-free in Joplin’s watering holes. I stopped in at Rumors Lounge,1825 W. Seventh St. in Joplin, and sat down next to a guy with whom I sometimes swap stories and drink beer.

Dave Harris is a funny guy. He retired here after more than 40 years driving trucks in Chicago. Dave is a longtime smoker and makes no apology for it.

I asked him what he thought about the prospect of going smoke-free in Joplin’s bars and restaurants. I admit, I suspected I knew where he stood on the subject before I even asked.

“I think it would be bad for the bar business,” he told me, lighting a cigarette and taking a long drag. “Maybe not restaurants, but for bars, yeah. I think a law like that would put a lot of places out of business.”

Dave said he thinks the owners of establishments should be the ones to decide whether or not to go smoke-free.

“They are not going to open a bar for smokers only,” he laughed. “It’s smokers who don’t have any options. If a non-smoker doesn’t want to come in, then they don’t have to come in. They are the ones with options, not the smokers or the bar owners. The smokers and owners don’t have any options. It’s the non-smokers with all the options.”

I’ve only known Dave for a couple of months, but have often seen him move an ashtray with a smoldering cig downwind from another non-smoking customer, to keep the smoke from offending.

 “I try to be a courteous guy when I’m in a bar or a restaurant,” he said. “I always put out my cigarette when someone is eating near by. If I’m sitting 40 feet away from someone that’s eating in a non-smoking section, I don’t think my smoke is going to bother them. I mean 40 feet away, really?”

No illusions

Dave, like many of my friends who smoke, is under no illusion where the ill effects of tugging on a cancer stick is concerned.

“Everybody who smokes knows it’s bad for them,” he said. “But, it’s our choice.”

While Dave said he has no plan to kick his 50-year habit, he did say he’s under some heavy pressure at home to cut back or quit all together.

 “Put it this way,” he said, “My grandson has started telling me I need to quit. He’s 5 years old, but I think his mother is putting him up to it.”

At 61, Dave said he’s in as good of health as any guy his age and assured me he has no smoking-related health issues.

Where the dangers of second-hand smoke are concern, Dave is unconvinced.

“I’m don’t know about second hand smoke,” he said “They say it’s bad, but I don’t know. Being a smoker right now, I wouldn’t go into a bar where I couldn’t smoke. I’d grab a 12-pack and a carton of cigarettes and just go home where I can still smoke — at least for now.”

Text Only
Enjoy
Parade
Magazine
Click HERE to read all your Parade favorites including Hollywood Wire, Celebrity interviews and photo galleries, Food recipes and cooking tips, Games and lots more.
Local News

Best of Branson

Facebook
Poll

Eliminating the state income tax and increasing sales tax was debated during a press day on Thursday at the Missouri Capitol. Do you favor that proposal?

Yes.
No.
     View Results
Twitter Updates
Follow us on twitter
Follow me on Twitter
Globe Life

NDN Video
Recording Superstar Whitney Houston Dead at 48 Maine GOP Chairman Says Romney Wins Caucuses Palin Brings Anti-Washington Message to CPAC Obama Scraps Birth Control Mandate US Airmen's Killer Sentenced to Life in Germany Navy Names Ship for Gabrielle Giffords Raw Video: Deadly Blasts in Syria Romney Slams President Obama at CPAC Gingrich: Pres. Obama 'waging War on Religion' 5 Killed in Wrong-way Crash on I-10 in La. Uzbek Man Pleads Guilty in Plot to Kill Obama Denver's Largest-Ever Drug Bust Nets Dozens Marines: No Punishment for Nazi-like Flag Vets Look to Translate Military Skills Into Jobs Raw Video: School Bus Burst Into Flames LA School Reopens Amid Sex Abuse Scandal $25B Settlement Reached Over Foreclosure Abuses Pentagon: Allow Women Closer to Front Lines LA School in Sex Abuse Scandal Reopens Raw Video: Italy's Mount Etna Bursts Into Life
May 2011 Joplin tornado