The leadership of the City Council announced yesterday that it was seeking sweeping new restrictions on smoking in New York City, banning it in virtually all public places, from outdoor arenas and playgrounds to most restaurants and offices, except in enclosed, specially ventilated rooms.
The city already has smoking restrictions, passed in 1988, that require designated nonsmoking areas in restaurants and other public places and that limit smoking in the workplace. But the new legislation, introduced by Council Speaker Peter F. Vallone of Queens and for that reason very likely to be passed by the Council, would make New York one of the most smoking -restrictive cities in the nation.
Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani said yesterday that he endorsed broad curbs on smoking in public, although he noted that he had not yet reviewed the Speaker's legislation. "I generally favor as much restriction as possible on cigarette smoking, particularly since it affects the health of others," he said.
Growing Evidence
The legislation comes at a time when more and more cities and states, as well as private companies on their own initiative, are taking steps to restrict smoking in response to growing evidence about the dangers of smoking or inhaling secondhand smoke.
And given the tobacco industry's willingness to spend millions of dollars to fight smoking restrictions, Mr. Vallone's proposal will put New York City at the center of a debate over how far government can or should go in trying to regulate smoking.
The proposal would force all employers, regardless of size, to restrict smoking to enclosed, specially ventilated rooms and would limit such rooms to one on each floor of a building. Smoking would be restricted to separate rooms in pool halls and separate sections of outdoor cafes. It would be banned in outdoor areas of child-care agencies and in the seats at Shea and Yankee Stadiums.
Few Exemptions
The legislation would exempt only a few, narrowly defined places, including restaurants with fewer than 50 seats, nightclubs and bars that are not attached to public areas in restaurants or hotels. Mr. Vallone said such restaurants would be exempted because their size would make it extremely difficult to set up separate smoking rooms.
The proposed restrictions, while welcomed by elected officials who oppose smoking and by anti- smoking advocates, drew immediate criticism from some quarters. Brennan Dawson, a spokeswoman for the Tobacco Institute in Washington, the lobbyist for major tobacco companies, said the New York legislation amounted to "a total ban" on smoking without scientific proof of the dangers of passive smoke. "If what you're seeking to do is to minimize exposure, New York already has that," she said. "If you're seeking the next step, penalizing or quarantining smokers, then this is it."
Fred G. Sampson, president of the New York State Restaurant Association, which represents nearly 2,000 of the 16,000 restaurants in the city, said the legislation would put onerous burdens on restaurant owners, requiring most of them to construct separate rooms with special ventilation or simply to forbid smoking altogether at the risk of losing customers.
'Our Customers'
"This bill is going to cause quite a few problems," Mr. Sampson said. "It would be costly, and we think it would be difficult to deal with."
Alex von Bidder, general manager of the Four Seasons, said: "We're in the hospitality business. We shouldn't be in the policing business. Smokers and nonsmokers are our customers."
In recent years, dozens of cities, including Los Angeles and San Francisco, and several states, like Vermont, Maryland and Washington, have restricted smoking in public places, including offices or restaurants. Last month the Clinton Administration said it supported legislation in Congress to impose Federal limits on smoking in public buildings.
In New York, the City Council first restricted smoking in most public places in 1988 in the Clean Indoor Air Act, making it one of the most restrictive cities in the nation, according to advocates on both sides of issue. Since then, the city has imposed other anti- smoking regulations, including bans on the distribution of free cigarettes and the sale of loose cigarettes.
Mr. Vallone said he proposed the curbs because of mounting evidence of the harm caused by secondhand smoke at work and in restaurants.
"We want to go even farther," said Mr. Vallone, who was joined as co-sponsors by three Council members, Enoch H. Williams, Stanley E. Michels and Juanita E. Watkins. "Secondhand smoke represents a serious health risk," Mr. Vallone said.
The legislation's greatest impact would fall on the city's businesses.
Under the current law, businesses with more than 15 employees have to provide a smoke-free environment for employees -- most often through designated smoking areas or rooms. The new legislation would require all employers to restrict smoking to only one room on each floor of a business. Smoking would still be allowed in private rooms, but only if occupied by only one person. The same would apply to company cars or trucks.
In restaurants, now required to provide nonsmoking areas, the legislation would forbid smoking except in separately enclosed rooms, with separate ventilation systems to pump out smoky air. Those rooms could not exceed 25 percent of total indoor seating. Outdoor restaurants or cafes, now unrestricted, would be required to create nonsmoking sections.
Although bars would be exempt, those that make 40 percent or more of their annual income from food would be considered restaurants and thus subject to the restrictions.
The legislation would also prohibit smoking in the outdoor areas of sports arenas or other recreational areas, from Yankee Stadium or Aqueduct Raceway to ballfields and playgrounds in the city's parks or outdoor concerts where seating is assigned. It would also apply to bingo parlors or recreation centers. Larger arenas would be allowed to create the separate, indoor smoking rooms.
Representatives of several companies that manage office buildings expressed skepticism about whether the law can be enforced beyond lobbies and other public spaces.
"For us to try to detect if, say, a tenant on the 27th floor in a corner office is smoking a cigarette would be impossible," said John C. Fantora, director of management services for Cushman & Wakefield, a leading property-managment company.
Earle Yaffa, managing director of Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom, a law firm with about 1,500 employees in New York City, said he felt the firm could adapt to the restrictions. "It would create certain inconveniences, especially for smokers," he said, "but we already have designated smoking areas in our offices now that seem to be satisfactory."
But Mike Reardon, a smoker who owns the Lion's Head bar and restaurant in Greenwich Village, said smoking curbs appeared misdirected, attacking smokers instead of the tobacco industry. "If secondhand smoke is that pernicious, start at the top and close down R.J. Reynolds," he said.
The legislation would not change the penalties now in effect under the Clean Indoor Air Act and enforced by the city's Health Department. A person caught violating the restrictions can be fined up to $50. Employers or restaurants can be fined up to $100 for the first offense, $200 for a second and $300 for a third.
Joseph W. Cherner, a former bond trader who created Smokefree Education Services, said passage of the new curbs "would certainly act as a domino effect."
