Bar owners smolder over smoking ban.

Byline: JEFF WRIGHT The Register-Guard

Shon O'Donnell says he never wanted to be a cop, but that he feels like he's become one.

At his Irish pub in west Eugene, O'Donnell says he's the one who has to enforce the city's indoor smoking ban - or run the risk of being fined or losing his liquor license.

The 33-year-old father of two says it galls him that he has to enforce a law he doesn't believe in.

"I can't believe I've been put in these circumstances," he says. "How many people want to tell customers that they can't do what they've come into your business to do?"

O'Donnell and other bar owners in Eugene say their situation has gone from bad to worse since Jan. 1, when a new statewide ban on workplace smoking went into effect.

The state law exempts bars, bingo halls and bowling alleys from the smoking ban - but that's no help to bar owners in Eugene, one of four cities in Oregon with more stringent laws that ban all indoor smoking, including in bars.

"It's really unfair when we have to play by a different set of rules," O'Donnell says.

A former tire salesman, O'Donnell has owned his pub for six years and built up the business with pool tournaments, karaoke and lots of elbow grease.

"It's just your typical `Cheers' neighborhood bar," he says. He estimates that about 70 percent of his customers smoke.

Despite a half-dozen no-smoking signs on the premises, O'Donnell says he's "constantly" reminding patrons not to light up. ``I skid an ashtray at them and tell them, `Sorry, you can't smoke in here,' ' he says.

Many customers go outside, where O'Donnell has erected a tent and eventually plans to build a deck for smokers. But apparently not everyone has gotten the message.

The pub, located on Highway 99 North, was one of five cited by the city earlier this week for allegedly violating the city's smoking ban.

One person who filed a complaint said he saw at least six people smoking in the pub, and that a bartender declined to intervene after a customer refused to put out a cigarette. Another person said she saw at least four customers smoking, and that ashtrays were provided at the bar.

O'Donnell says he wasn't working at the time of the alleged violations and that he's checking with his lawyer about whether to pay or appeal the $420 fine.

At another bar, The Keg on West 11th Avenue, owner Jim Coleman says his biggest gripe with the city ban is that it's not consistently enforced and, he believes, widely ignored.

"I have customers come in, and when I tell them they can't smoke, they say, `Well, this is the third bar (in Eugene) I've been in today, and you're the first one who said I can't smoke.' '

The law's only enforcement, Coleman says, "is one guy squealing on another guy." He's right: City officials say alleged infractions are investigated only when someone calls the Lane County Public Health Department's no-smoking complaint line (682-6687).

Coleman says inconsistent enforcement is causing people to flout the law, and putting extra pressure on businesses. "People are going to feel like they have to bend the rules, whether they want to or not, just to stay in business," he says.

Patty McCall, owner of The Cooler Pub & Grill on Centennial Loop, says she's already worried about staying in business. She says she lost $60,000 in sales between October and December, compared with those same three months the previous year, and she puts most of the blame on the city's smoking ban.

"My after-work crowd's not here, and I'm not seeing as many late-night kids," she says.

McCall is among several bar owners who say they may ask the City Council to revise the smoking ban so it's consistent with the less-restrictive state law. There's precedent: The Tillamook County Board of Commissioners recently rescinded a no-smoking law that was more restrictive.

But Laura Culberson, director of the Tobacco-Free Coalition of Oregon, says her group opposes such efforts. Culberson says the new state law has bred massive confusion because of all its exemptions and "loopholes."

"In our view, the Eugene law should be the model for Oregon's law," she says. "It's so clean, so clear-cut, it doesn't foster these difficulties."

Eugene is among five governmental jurisdictions in Oregon - the others are Benton County and the cities of Corvallis, Philomath and St. Helens - that have indoor smoking bans with no exemptions.

Four other cities - Baker City, Grants Pass, Lake Oswego and Tualatin - have bans that include exemptions but are still more restrictive than the state ban, according to the state coalition.

The state law represents a legislative compromise between tobacco-free advocacy groups and the Oregon Restaurant Association and other business groups. Fearful of the growing number of cities embracing inclusive smoking bans, the ORA pushed for a law that would stop any more cities from following suit.

Shon O'Donnell has his own opinion about that. "The ORA caved," he complains, sipping a beer at a table in his pub. "They screwed Eugene."

But O'Donnell says his biggest grievance is against a city law that he hates but ignores at his own peril: "It's like they've decided to extort me: Either enforce it or we'll hit you over the head."

CAPTION(S):

CHRIS PIETSCH / The Register-Guard Shon O'Donnell, owner of O'Donnell's Pub, resents having to enforce Eugene's smoking ban, which he opposes.