Proposed stricter smoking bylaw moves ahead

The Ottawa Board of Health has given the thumbs up to a new, harsher smoking bylaw, which has hurdled one more roadblock before coming to fruition. The new regulations, first proposed Jan. 30, would ban smoking at bar and restaurant patios and at city-run beaches and parks. Smoking would also be prohibited on any festival run on city property. Bylaw officers plan to use the spring to issue warnings to smokers and help people get used to the new rules. The fines, which are expected to be about $300, would start in the summer. But at a meeting Monday night, many anti-smoking advocates and Ottawa residents spoke in favour of a harsher bylaw.

Many thought the next step should be banning all smoking on sidewalks. Others, such as one cancer survivor who underwent chemotherapy 10 years ago, want smoking banned on hospital campuses. "Imagine how I felt, when I walked past the cancer centre patients standing outside the clinic, who were holding a cigarette in one hand, and an intravenous pole in the other," said Catherine Caule, who survived Hodgkin's Lymphoma. Ottawa residents want even harsher restrictions Many public speakers Monday questioned the exemptions instead of lauding the increased restrictions. Hookah or shisha bars, where customers can smoke non-tobacco products from water pipes indoors, were exempt and that caused uproar.

City officials argued other levels of government need to change their law before the city puts a bylaw in place on hookahs. "We kind of came into some legal impediments at a municipal level [with hookahs] so they're part of the advocacy strategy," said Sherry Nigro, the manager responsible for pandemic planning at Ottawa Public Health. "[We need] to explain to other levels of government that these might be areas that they could expand." Nigro added provincial laws prevent the city from going after smokers on sidewalks, too, but officials plan to seek legal advice regarding a loophole. The enhanced bylaw will next go to the community and protective services committee on Feb. 15. If it passes committee, city council will look at the proposal Feb. 22.