Should Elk Grove Restrict Smoking and Tobacco Sales Near Schools?

If some Elk Grove residents get their way, it could one day be illegal to light up within 1000 feet of a school or other place in the city where children gather.

The city council is set to begin discussion Wednesday night on an idea floated by a community group earlier this year: protect kids from the health effects of cigarettes by banning both smoking and tobacco sales in designated areas throughout the city.

“I think that is reasonable for parents to expect that their children will not be exposed to potential cancer causing agents when sending them off to pre-school, daycare and such,” Linda Ford, president of the Elk Grove Coalition for Proper Planning, said in an email to council members and reporters earlier this week.

The proposal faces several practical barriers.

About 100 businesses in Elk Grove currently sell tobacco, many without the special licenses the city requires, city staff says—and many are already located near schools. With so many businesses “grandfathered in,” the effect of regulating new retailers could be minimal, according to a staff report prepared for council members.

Regulating smoking itself could easier to accomplish. Elk Grove’s sex offender ordinance already defines a range of places from parks to day care centers as “children’s facilities.” Smoking could be legally banned from the area around those facilities with an exception made for private residences, says the report.

The proposal comes at a time when the tobacco industry faces yet another round of scrutiny at the national level.  Graphic new warnings illustrating the consequences of smoking will start appearing on cigarette boxes in fall 2012, part of new requirements issued by the Food and Drug Administration. It’s the first update to cigarette labeling in 25 years.

At , city staff will ask the council for direction on whether they want to draft a formal tobacco ordinance to be voted on and possibly adopted.

Readers, what do you think? Should the city council regulate tobacco sales and use near children?