Enforce the rules we have

On Tuesday, Columbia will hold a town hall meeting on the proposal to ban smoking on campus. Haven’t heard about it? Not surprising.

On Tuesday, Columbia will hold a town hall meeting on the proposal to ban smoking on campus. Haven’t heard about it? Not surprising. Outside of a few groups on campus, no one’s talked about it. That, in and of itself, is problematic for such a large policy change. Without public notice, small minorities, whether they are supporters or opponents of smoking, have virtual control over campus governance. Whether the broader student population wants it or not, a draconian policy might be imposed simply because supporters showed up at a meeting to gauge support. If only die-hards vote, the vote does not reflect the sentiment of the population as a whole and indeed poses a real threat to representative government. Even more noticeably, though, smoking is already banned across much of campus to little effect.

You wouldn’t know it from walking around campus, but smoking is banned within 25 feet of a building by state law. Where does that end? Who knows? It’s not marked. Even if someone wanted to obey the law, they would be hard-pressed to do so. Without any visible indications of where smokers can’t light up, the entrance to Butler becomes a cloud of tobacco smoke. That’s a real concern, especially for asthmatics, and Columbia’s learning environment is not fostered by forcing library-goers to brave an onslaught of smoke. There’s no reason they should have to, either. Smoking should be forbidden there.

Yet the Columbia administration is not focusing on that very real issue. Rather than putting up signs to indicate where smoking is and is not allowed, the administration is pushing a campus-wide ban on smoking under the radar without student knowledge, let alone input. Why? Would administrators enforce a new ban any more than the current ban is enforced? We can’t know. From the limited coverage in campus media, it has not been mentioned. Would Public Safety round up smokers on campus? Unlikely, but all the time they would spend telling students, and even faculty, to put out their cigarettes is time they would not be spending protecting students from crime.

In addition, unenforced rules erode respect for all rules. If the smoking ban is enacted and not enforced, it will spread a general disrespect for authority. If the smoking regulations are not enforced, this sends a very powerful signal that other rules, whether about underage drinking or writing graffiti on walls, will not be, either. Ultimately, this results in a broader lack of regard for campus standards and seemingly give smokers carte blanche to violate the rules.
If a complete ban were enforced, on the other hand, that would drive smokers off campus. The main gates and other entrances to campus would be clouded by smoke. If you think the smoke in front of Butler is bad, imagine how much worse it would be if all the smokers on campus were standing on 116th and Broadway, clustered together to form an even larger, more threatening cloud. Who would want to go to a school where they have to go through that to get to campus? Students would go off campus to find activities where the long arm of Public Safety wouldn’t tell them not to smoke. In a puff, Columbia’s effort to support student activities would be gone. Smokers would be less engaged in student life on campus, and considering that a number of student leaders smoke, Columbia’s vibrancy would decline.

The best thing to do would be for Columbia to enforce its current ban on smoking near buildings. Without depending on a massive witch hunt for smokers across campus, the administration could put up signs near buildings reminding students and faculty not to light up there but marking where smoking is permitted. Public Safety, in the course of its normal rounds, could remind smokers too close to buildings to take a step back without requiring a significant presence beyond what already exists. At the same time, rather than wasting money criminalizing a large portion of the Columbia community, the savings could be used to help smokers quit. It wouldn’t even require a drastic policy change. If that’s not enough, and scientific studies show that expanding a smoking ban would result in measurable improvements, the administration can publicly educate the community about the benefits of a change and wait for the democratic process to work.

Seaford police send out reminder

SEAFORD Police are reminding adults it is an offence to purchase alcohol on behalf of children.
They warned anyone buying booze for underage drinkers will receive a fixed penalty notice of £80.
Police are appealing for information about irresponsible adults buying alcohol and cigarettes for youngsters. 
Sgt Chris Veale said: "Disorder caused by drunken teenagers is a large drain on police resources and a major concern for local residents.
"The young people involved are also putting themselves at risk in a number of ways – either by being a victim of crime or by taking part in high risk behaviour."

FDA starts collecting fees from tobacco companies

The Food and Drug Administration on Thursday began collecting millions in fees from the nation's tobacco companies to help fund the agency's newly granted authority to regulate the industry.
The user fees, which will be collected quarterly, are based on each company's share of the U.S. tobacco market. The FDA will collect about $23 million for fiscal 2009. That will rise to $235 million in 2010 and grow to $712 million by 2019.
The FDA would not disclose the assessments for specific companies.
Stifel, Nicolaus & Co. analyst Christopher Growe said in a note to investors that Richmond, Va.-based Altria Group Inc., owner of market-leading Philip Morris USA, would be responsible for about 50 percent of the fees.
FDA spokeswoman Kathleen Quinn said the fees will be used to fund the Center for Tobacco Products, the agency's group tasked with regulating tobacco. The fees will pay for staffing, offices, systems that will be used to register products and outside contractors.
In June, President Barack Obama signed the law that allows the FDA regulate the industry. Its authority includes the ability to ban certain products, reduce nicotine in tobacco products and block labels such "low tar" and "light." Tobacco companies also will be required to cover their cartons with large, graphic warnings.
The law doesn't let the FDA ban nicotine or tobacco outright.
The Congressional Budget Office estimated in June that the law would reduce the number of underage tobacco users by 11 percent by 2019 and lead to a 2 percent decline in smoking among adults.
Altria supported the legislation, while its chief rivals -- No. 2 Reynolds American Inc. and No. 3 Lorillard Inc., both based in North Carolina -- opposed it. The latter two have joined in a lawsuit with other smaller tobacco companies challenging specific marketing regulations of the law.
The nation's tobacco companies already pay $1.01 per pack that it sells for federal excise taxes, and the top cigarette makers also make yearly payments as part of the landmark 1998 tobacco settlement to reimburse states for smoking-related health care costs.
In that settlement, tobacco companies agreed to make about $206 billion in annual payments over more than two decades. Companies also make payments as part of legislation that ended the federal tobacco program, a quota program that limited and stabilized the amount of tobacco produced by farmers.

Now you can report tax-dodging businesses via the web

Following recent initiatives to clamp down on tax evasion, you can now report businesses you believe are evading tax via the web.
HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) has made clamping down on tax cheats one of its key priorities in recent years, with a reported £42m being recovered since 2005 as a result of information provided by members of the public via traditional telephone hotlines.
Given the state of the public finances, it will probably come as no surprise that the Government is keen to increase its efforts to shore up the Treasury's coffers. You can now use the web to report tax evaders at www.hmrc.gov.uk/tax-evasion
According to HMRC, this new facility, enabling members of the public to raise their concerns online, builds on HMRC’s cross tax approach to compliance, helping to identify and tackle high-risk cases early on. Under its new behaviourally based system of penalties HMRC can now charge penalties of up to 100% for those individuals who deliberately evade tax.
Interestingly, information received through the hotlines over past years has led to the successful recovery of 320kg of class A drugs, along with 27 million illegal cigarettes and 9.7 tonnes of hand rolling tobacco!
"Denying funding for essential public services"
Linking the relatively small amount of tax recovered via hotlines in recent years with the multi-billion pound black hole in the Government's finances, Rt Hon Stephen Timms MP, Financial Secretary to the Treasury, said:
“We are committed to ensuring the tax system operates fairly and efficiently, and encourage anyone to share their information on activities they think may be unlawful. Reporting your concerns online is quick and easy. By doing so you will be helping us to catch people who are unfairly competing with honest businesses and denying funding for essential public services.
“Being able to report potential tax evasion online is just the latest step in demonstrating that for tax cheats the game is up.
“Information provided by the public is important and HMRC takes all allegations seriously.”

Some tobacco farmers dealt late-season setback

LOUISVILLE — Recent heavy rains that soaked Kentucky delivered a late-season setback to some tobacco farmers as their leaf ripens, dampening their hopes for a bumper crop after a couple of drought years.More than a half-foot of rain fell across part of the Bluegrass State last week as the bulk of the burley tobacco crop was curing in barns — an autumn ritual when the long green leaves gradually change to reddish brown in a process that prepares the leaf for market. The prolonged stretch of wet weather in the state that leads the nation in burley production at least briefly heightened the risk of tobacco being afflicted with mold or fungus that can rot away part of the leaf.
Fields with uncut tobacco turned into muddy bogs, slowing harvest and hurting leaf quality.
"It's certainly putting a hardship on the farmers," said Nick Carter, agricultural extension agent in Fayette County in central Kentucky.
Will Snell, a University of Kentucky agricultural economist specializing in tobacco, said burley, an ingredient in cigarettes, started out curing well, but the combination of high humidity and rain has been "very hard on the crop."
That has added to the anxiety of farmers growing tobacco under contract for tobacco companies. A poor crop can be turned away or fetch a lower price.
"There's a lot of fear with guys knowing that the tobacco companies aren't going to take low-quality tobacco," said Kenny Seebold, a UK extension tobacco specialist.
"Everybody here is on thin margins. They need all the income that they can get."
A weekly report stated some farmers indicated that the high humidity and wet weather are "taking a toll on housed tobacco," according to the National Agricultural Statistics Service's Kentucky field office.
Snell said timing could be crucial in determining how well each individual crop cures this fall.
Burley that reached the barn early in the season "may still do well," he said, but later-planted tobacco housed just before the onslaught of rains "may have some major issues."
Another factor, he said, is that "some farmers crammed the tobacco in the barn too tightly due to limited barn space, and that is just adding to the problem."