REGINA – Health groups at this week’s SUMA convention are calling on municipal leaders to take a stronger stance against smoking.
The Lung Association of Saskatchewan, Heart and Stroke Foundation and Canadian Cancer Society are all calling on Saskatchewan cities to ban smoking in public outdoor places, including children’s playgrounds, sports fields, festivals and concerts and patios at restaurants and bars.
They cite overwhelming public support.
“The numbers are extremely high, up into the 90’s for support, especially for playgrounds,” said Jennifer Miller of the Lung Association. “We actually have fallen behind. There are actually many municipalities across the country who’ve adopted these outdoor public space policies.”
However, there’s only one city in Saskatchewan – Saskatoon banned smoking on patios in 2004, but 10 years later, no one else has followed suit.
“They’ve actually come out in a study for protecting the public against second hand smoke as #1 , where Regina ranked #16,” said Miller.
Despite those findings, tighter smoking bans are not on the radar in the queen city.
“The City of Regina is not looking at that right now. It doesn’t mean we won’t do that, but it’s certainly not on the agenda for SUMA at this convention,” said Regina mayor, Michael Fougere.
Still, some patios have gone ahead without a bylaw: the Willow on Wascana and Beer Bros. are two which don’t allow smoking.
It’s a food service area and when you’re having a meal, you don’t necessarily want to have smoke wafting over from your table or other people’s tables,” said Beer Bros. Gastropub and Deli partner, Greg Hanwell.
He said other restaurants and pubs shouldn’t be afraid of losing clientele, nor wait for the city to step in.
“My belief is they should plug their nose, take the jump in and ban it. And they’ll find out that it’s not really going to hurt their business.”
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