Archived Story
Editorial: Smoke-free apartments have more pros than cons
Published 9:11am Wednesday, December 28, 2011
Smoke-free apartments is quite a high hurdle for many landlords and property managers. It could upset many loyal tenants.
We ask that landlords and property manager look at the idea of smoke-free apartments and weight the pros and cons. In the end, they might discover happier, healthier tenants.
Here are points to consider:
• Secondhand smoke is dangerous. According to Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota, 581 infants and adults died in 2005 from secondhand smoke. It causes emphysema, asthma, pneumonia, lung cancer, chronic bronchitis and heart disease.
• Nearly 50 percent of tenants in Minnesota say smoke gets into their apartment from somewhere in their building, according to research by the Center for Energy and Environment.
• Of those, 37 percent say it bothers them enough that they consider moving.
• And get this from the same study: “Many renters would pay more rent and make other sacrifices such as walking farther to a bus stop or driving farther to work if they could live in a smoke-free building.”
• Some immediate benefits of smoke-free apartments are: reduced cleaning costs, fewer fire risks and fewer disagreements among tenants.
• Many owners see a decrease in turnover and vacancy rates.
Is it legal for landlords and property managers to make an entire apartment building smoke-free? You bet it is.
In fact, many have struck a compromise with smokers by designating a smoking area outside, usually under a veranda or some covering in case of rain.
Of all the reasons, probably the reduced risk of apartment fires is the major motivator to most landlords and property managers. And in apartments, sometimes the victims of fires are not the people whose cigarettes started the fires. It only takes one incident, such as the cigarette-caused fire in Bloomington in July 2006, to prompt many apartments in a city to go smoke-free.
If a landlord or property manager needs more information on smoke-free apartments, visit the website for Live Smoke Free at www.mnsmokefreehousing.org.
Welcome to the Minnesota DFL Nannystate, leave your rights and freedoms at the Iowa border as the state knows what is best for you as “it’s for your own good”
I cannot help but to wonder where http://www.mnsmokefreehousing.org gets it’s funding.
For the record I do not smoke but that is my decision not one that the state has “helped” me make.
These folks are nut cases. They are undoubtly financed by ANR americans for non-smokers right and JOHN BANzhaft THE LAWYER who sues over anything.
Their ASHRAE REPORT listed in their link was basically written by JAMES REPACE its the one where repace claims it would take tornadic winds to remove smoke from a indoor structure…..Repace discredited himself and his movement in court with his junk science and carcinogen meter read more here:
Schuman’s Expert Witnesses Testify in Secondhand Smoke Trial
The plaintiff’s expert witnesses spoke up on day three of David Schuman’s case against his housing cooperative, Greenbelt Homes, Inc. (GHI), for its failure to prohibit the nuisance created by his townhome neighbors, the Popovics’, secondhand smoke.
Courtroom and Plaintiff’s Townhome Register Similar Carcinogen Levels
But, an incident from Repace’s testimony Thursday came back into play Friday during cross examination. Goecke pointed out that on Thursday, while demonstrating the carcinogen monitor, Repace had measured the concentration of carcinogens in the court room — which is in a smoke-free building — and the amount he recorded there was similar to what Repace had reported recording in Schuman’s townhome in July of 2011.
greenbelt.patch.com/articles/schumans-expert-witnesses-testify-in-secondhand-smoke-trial
Secondhand smoke is dangerous. According to Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota, 581 infants and adults died in 2005 from secondhand smoke. It causes emphysema, asthma, pneumonia, lung cancer, chronic bronchitis and heart disease.
Funny thing,its all lies! If they had 581 dead babies theyd be harping it from here to eternity.
They cant even prove direct smoking causes cancer much less shs a created phantom killer!
Not 1 Death or Sickness Etiologically Assigned to Tobacco. All the diseases attributed to smoking are also present in non smokers. It means, in other words, that they are multifactorial, that is, the result of the interaction of tens, hundreds, sometimes thousands of factors, either known or suspected contributors – of which smoking can be one.
They have created a fear that is based on nothing’’
World-renowned pulmonologist, president of the prestigious Research Institute Necker for the last decade, Professor Philippe Even, now retired, tells us that he’s convinced of the absence of harm from passive smoking. A shocking interview.
What do the studies on passive smoking tell us?
PHILIPPE EVEN. There are about a hundred studies on the issue. First surprise: 40% of them claim a total absence of harmful effects of passive smoking on health. The remaining 60% estimate that the cancer risk is multiplied by 0.02 for the most optimistic and by 0.15 for the more pessimistic … compared to a risk multiplied by 10 or 20 for active smoking! It is therefore negligible. Clearly, the harm is either nonexistent, or it is extremely low.
It is an indisputable scientific fact. Anti-tobacco associations report 3 000-6 000 deaths per year in France …
I am curious to know their sources. No study has ever produced such a result.
Many experts argue that passive smoking is also responsible for cardiovascular disease and other asthma attacks. Not you?
They don’t base it on any solid scientific evidence. Take the case of cardiovascular diseases: the four main causes are obesity, high cholesterol, hypertension and diabetes. To determine whether passive smoking is an aggravating factor, there should be a study on people who have none of these four symptoms. But this was never done. Regarding chronic bronchitis, although the role of active smoking is undeniable, that of passive smoking is yet to be proven. For asthma, it is indeed a contributing factor … but not greater than pollen!
The purpose of the ban on smoking in public places, however, was to protect non-smokers. It was thus based on nothing?
Absolutely nothing! The psychosis began with the publication of a report by the IARC, International Agency for Research on Cancer, which depends on the WHO (Editor’s note: World Health Organization). The report released in 2002 says it is now proven that passive smoking carries serious health risks, but without showing the evidence. Where are the data? What was the methodology? It’s everything but a scientific approach. It was creating fear that is not based on anything.
Why would anti-tobacco organizations wave a threat that does not exist?
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The anti-smoking campaigns and higher cigarette prices having failed, they had to find a new way to lower the number of smokers. By waving the threat of passive smoking, they found a tool that really works: social pressure. In good faith, non-smokers felt in danger and started to stand up against smokers. As a result, passive smoking has become a public health problem, paving the way for the Evin Law and the decree banning smoking in public places. The cause may be good, but I do not think it is good to legislate on a lie. And the worst part is that it does not work: since the entry into force of the decree, cigarette sales are rising again.
Why not speak up earlier?
As a civil servant, dean of the largest medical faculty in France, I was held to confidentiality. If I had deviated from official positions, I would have had to pay the consequences. Today, I am a free man.
Le Parisien
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I don’t have a problem with smoke free apartments in the least, as long as the decision is a choice of the property owner and not one that is legislated by a bunch of know nothings in the twin cities. I also don’t believe that it would be fair to allow a landlord to decide to be smoke-free and in turn force tenants that have always smoked in their apartments to smoke outside under a canopy. By the way I am not a smoker and haven’t been for over 15 years, but I believe in individual rights, rather than a nanny state.