According to Butch Hug, the Director of Events for the Athletic Department, the decision to make the stadium smoke free had been in response to repeated complaints from fans that the smoking areas were not honored. The decision was first announced as part of a high school all-star game. “When it was announced, it was received very well,” said Hug. “As I recall, there was a lot of applause.”While making a stadium smoke free may not seem highly significant, the home games for the Nebraska Cornhuskers football team represent an extremely popular sporting event in the state so making Memorial Stadium smoke free represented an important event in tobacco control in Nebraska. In 1997, Senator Preister again attempted to make state buildings and vehicles smoke free.LB 375, which was very similar to previous bills, advanced out of committee by a vote of 6-0 but once again, did not survive the floor of the Legislature.State buildings and vehicles finally became smoke free in 1999 after five years of attempting to pass such legislation.This time around Senator Preister did not introduce the bill. Senator Jerry Schmitt introduced LB 211 with a much more modest goal: he was only seeking to make the State Capitol Building smoke free to halt the damage that was being done to the Capitol and its artwork due to tobacco smoke.The Health and Human Services Committee advanced LB 211 by a vote of 6-0 after hearing testimony from Cathy Shipp of Metro Omaha Tobacco Awareness Coalition , Susie Dugan of PRIDE-Omaha and Leon Vinci of the Lincoln-Lancaster County Health Department.
No one testified against LB 211.MOTAC and PRIDE-Omaha are both health organizations located in Omaha that work closely together with MOTAC focusing on tobacco and PRIDE-Omaha working to decrease the use of alcohol,vertical growing system tobacco and other drugs . In 1999, many other tobacco control advocates were focusing on an cigarette excise tax bill and were not heavily involved with supporting LB 211 . On the floor of the Legislature, state senators went to work trying to expand the scope of LB 211. During the first round of debate, an amendment proposed by Senator Gene Tyson was adopted which included all state buildings in the bill. The amendment was so broadly worded that senators felt it was necessary to propose additional amendments to clarify the intent and scope of the bill.Another amendment that was offered during the first round of debate by Senator Chris Beutler of Lincoln would have also included any buildings leased to the state or building leased by the state to other institutions, such as fraternities or sororities, but this amendment failed after Senator Landis of Lincoln expressed concerns that the amendment was too broad to pass without conducting a public hearing to determine the legal ramifications.LB 211 passed the first round by a vote of 28-6 with Tyson’s amendment attached. During the second round of debate, another amendment was introduced by Senator Preister that attempted to clarify the scope of LB 211. The amendment sought to make all state owned vehicles and almost all state owned buildings smoke free.The buildings that were exempted from being completely smoke free were veterans homes, private residences, buildings under the control of Health and Humans Services, lodging facilities run by the Game and Parks Commission, facilities at the State Fair that possessed a liquor license and residential housing at state universities; however, it was designated in the amendment that no more than 25% of the overnight facilities, 50% of the beer halls at the Fair and 40% of the university housing could permit smoking.It also prohibited smoking within 10 feet of a state-owned building.
This final provision regarding the 10-foot barrier proved to be a sticking point in the debate over the amendment and it was only able to received 21 votes so it failed to be adopted.Two weeks later in March, 1997, Senator Preister sponsored a very similar amendment that had the 10 foot buffer area removed.This amendment was adopted by a vote of 33-0 and LB 211 was enacted by the Legislature by a vote of 43-0 and was subsequently signed by Governor Johanns.There was no opposition to Senator Preister’s amendment in this last round of debate. The final outcome of LB 211 was that the Nebraska Clean Indoor Air Act was amended so that the majority of state buildings, including the Capitol, and all state-owned or state-leased vehicles were made smoke free. The passage of this bill represented the first time in twenty years that the Nebraska Clean Indoor Air Act was strengthened.LB 750 also sought to make two other substantial changes to the Nebraska Clean Indoor Air Act. First, it sought to eliminate the exemption that allowed a restaurant that had a serving area of less than twelve hundred square feet to be considered a smoking area in its entirety. LB 750 also sought to clarify the definition of a public place by including grocery stores, convenience stores, assisted-living facilities and bowling centers within the definition of a public place.The inclusion of bowling centers resulted in several bowling groups joining together with the Nebraska Restaurant Association and the Nebraska Licensed Beverage Association to ally themselves with the tobacco industry. Beginning first in the 1970s, when clean indoor air laws concerning public places first began appearing through the country, the tobacco industry has worked to convince the hospitality industry that any limitations on smoking would cut into the hospitality industry’s profits.While a large number of studies have shown that smoke free laws have either no effect or a positive effect on business revenues,the tobacco industry has been successful in convincing members of the hospitality industry to oppose smoke free legislation.
In this manner, the tobacco industry, which has little public credibility, can remain behind the scenes by allowing the hospitality industry to serve as the public face of the opposition to smoke free laws. This pattern would occur in the debate over three smoke free restaurant bills proposed in the Legislature and a smoke free workplace ordinance that was attempted in Lincoln. At the public hearing for LB 750, held before the Health and Human Services Committee, three individuals representing bowling interests testified again Senator Thompson’s smoke free bill.These individuals were Butch Rasmussen of Cedar Bowl, Inc., Jim Dill of the Nebraska Bowling Proprietor’s Association and Steven Sempeck of Bowling Centers and the Nebraska Bowling Proprietor’s Association. An internal Philip Morris document listed Dill and his organization, Nebraska Bowling Proprietors’ Association, as hospitality industry allies.While only three people testified,marijuana drying there were over a dozen bowling center owners or managers that attended the hearing in opposition to LB 750.These bowling groups mobilized under false pretenses. It was their understanding that the addition of the term bowling alleys to the definition of public places meant their status under the Nebraska Clean Indoor Act changed but these was not the case.As Senator Thompson explained during the hearing, the only effect that LB 750 would have had on bowling centers was to clarify that they were included in the definition of a public place.Senator Thompson had consulted with the Department of Health and Human Services and was informed that LB 750 would not change the smoking status for bowling centers or other places that would have been explicitly included in the definition of public places.Also testifying against LB 750 were two individuals from more traditional allies of the tobacco industry.Jim Moylan stated that he was representing the Nebraska Licensed Beverage Association but Moylan was also a lobbyist for R.J. Reynolds as well ; Mark Lutz of the Nebraska Restaurant Association also spoke against the bill.94 The Nebraska Restaurant Association has a long history of opposing clean indoor air legislation dating back to the first introduction of clean indoor air bills in Nebraska and at this time, had receiving money from the tobacco industry at least as recently as 1997.4.Oddly, bowling proprietors outnumbered health advocates testifying in favor of LB 750. Susie Dugan of PRIDE-Omaha and Mark Welsch of the Group to Alleviate Smoking Pollution of Nebraska were the only tobacco control advocates that testified in favor of LB 750 at the committee hearing.PRIDE-Omaha was a grassroots organization of parents and community health groups formed to lower drug use by youth in Omaha including tobacco use and GASP of Nebraska has focused primarily on reducing exposure to tobacco smoke. Both groups were still active as of 2003. None of the large health groups spoke out in support of the bill.
The failure of Nebraska’s tobacco control advocates – particularly the large established health groups – to provide support for LB 750 also manifested itself in newspaper accounts throughout the course of the bill. While Senator Thompson’s position was often quoted, voices from the tobacco control groups in Nebraska were largely unheard.Health advocates were not more supportive of LB 750 for two reasons. First, the tobacco industry is more powerful at the state level so in virtually all states, there is a strong view that working to pass local smoke free ordinances is a more productive strategy in the long run. At the very least , local ordinances are usually passed before attempting a state law. The second reason was that many health advocates were fighting for the passage of LB 505, a bill that sought to raise the state’s excise tax from $0.34 to $1.00 and would also have provided funds for tobacco control efforts .The most prominent coalition in the state was Smoke Less Nebraska, which was a recipient of a Smokeless States grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and was comprised of the Nebraska divisions of the American Cancer Society, the American Heart Association, the American Lung Association, Health Education Inc., PRIDE-Omaha, the Nebraska Association of Hospitals and Health Systems, the Nebraska Dental Association and the Nebraska Medical Association.Prior to the 1999 legislative session, the members of Smoke Less Nebraska decided to form a second coalition that would focus primarily on increasing the state’s excise tax.This new coalition was named Citizens for a Healthy Nebraska. In 2003, Senator Thompson introduced LB 45 which sought to revise the Nebraska Clean Indoor Air Act to harmonize the Act with the new Health and Human Services rules and regulations and to make the Act more enforceable.Previously, Section 71- 5713 of the Nebraska Clean Indoor Air Act stated “The Department of Health and Human Services Regulation and Licensure, a local board of health, or any affected party may institute an action in any court with jurisdiction to enjoin any violation of section 71-5707.”Since section 71-5707 only dealt with individuals smoking in a nonsmoking area, a conservative interpretation of this section meant that only an individual smoker could be penalized for violating the Nebraska Clean Indoor Act. LB 45 sought to make it clear that the entire Act was enforceable; thus, business owners as well as individual smokers could be punished for failing to comply with the Nebraska Clean Indoor Air Act. LB 45 also contained language that specifically included grocery stores, convenience stores, and assisted-living facilities as public places,73 in addition to defining common areas to include “hallways, stairwells, water fountain areas, restrooms, lobbies, waiting areas, entrances, exits, and check-out counters.” Language in LB 45 also eliminated some exemptions in the Act such as smoking in private offices and the ability to designate an entire room or hall a smoking section for a private social function.The public hearing for LB 45 was conducted by the Health and Human Services Committee. The only individuals testifying in favor of LB 45 were Senator Thompson, as the introducer of the bill, and Mark Welsch, the president of GASP of Nebraska.Throughout the legislative process, LB 45 received only minimal support from the majority of tobacco control advocates in Nebraska.There were four opponents to the bill. Two individuals claimed to be testifying for themselves, R.J. Brown and Walt Radcliffe.Radcliffe has been a longtime tobacco lobbyist, and as of 2003, represented United States Tobacco . Also opposing LB 45 were Tim Keigher of the Nebraska Petroleum Marketers and Convenience Store Association and Kathy Siefken, representing the Nebraska Grocery Industry Association. Both these organizations have received money from the tobacco industry and have been listed on internal tobacco industry lists of allies within the state of Nebraska.