Mayor mulls office smoking ban.Lighting up in commercial office buildings may soon be illegal if MayorMichael Bloomberg's anti- smoking campaign passes muster TO MUSTER, mar. law. By this term is understood to collect together and exhibit soldiers and their arms; it also signifies to employ recruits and put their names down in a book to enroll them. . As it stands now, landlords can decide whether or not to forbid for·bid tr.v. for·bade or for·bad , for·bid·den or for·bid, for·bid·ding, for·bids 1. To command (someone) not to do something: I forbid you to go. 2. smoking in their buildings. Some do, others don't--but very soon it might not be that loose. "We're not going to take this lightly--this is killing people," said Bloomberg at a news conference last week. "We've asked the City Council to increase fines. Having legislation on the books where there is no penalty or a nominal penalty or where you don't enforce it, is hypocrisy Hypocrisy See also Pretension. Alceste judged most social behavior as hypocritical. [Fr. Lit.: Le Misanthrope] Ambrosio self-righteous abbot of the Capuchins at Madrid. [Br. Lit. and it does a disservice dis·ser·vice n. A harmful action; an injury. disservice Noun a harmful action Noun 1. to the public," said Bloomberg. The news has focused on bars and restaurants, where the smoking ban has been portrayed por·tray tr.v. por·trayed, por·tray·ing, por·trays 1. To depict or represent pictorially; make a picture of. 2. To depict or describe in words. 3. To represent dramatically, as on the stage. as hurting business. But the sweeping changes apply also to "all other workplaces," meaning all commercial office space in the city. "As managers of office buildings, we worry about smoking leading to a fire. But it's hard to enforce any rules on it," said Dana Gordon, executive vice president of property manager the Burak Organization. Burak allows their tenants to decide whether or not to allow smoking. City health regulations require that a designated smoking room be established, or else someone with a private office can shut their door when smoking. It is, however, forbidden to smoke in the common areas of all commercial office buildings (elevators, lobbies, stairwells etc). A call to the Tobacco Control Hotline revealed that a bill currently before the City Council would forbid smoking in all commercial office buildings in New York City New York City: see New York, city. New York City City (pop., 2000: 8,008,278), southeastern New York, at the mouth of the Hudson River. The largest city in the U.S. . "There's a lot of landlord discretion right now, but that might not last for long," said the hotline operator. Were the law passed, the City's Department of Health and Mental Hygiene mental hygiene, the science of promoting mental health and preventing mental illness through the application of psychiatry and psychology. A more commonly used term today is mental health. would enforce the ban. New York City would be joining two states--Delaware and California--in banning smoking in restaurants, bars and other workplaces. Maine, Utah and Vermont prohibit smoking in restaurants but not bars. |
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
Printer friendly
Cite/link
Email
Feedback
Reader Opinion