Question #5 on the November ballot
Looks like the public voted and Nevada is going to go smoke free in resturants and bars. This could start happening as soon as November 28th (if I got my facts straight).
Or maybe there is some sort of provission in it, like the Atlantic City version, where casinos are exempt?

Lee, I used the very fine links on the TalkVegas home page to go to the Review Journal site, and found this description of Question #5:

Shall Chapter 202 of the Nevada Revised Statutes be amended in order to prohibit smoking tobacco in certain public places, in all bars with a food-handling license, but excluding gaming areas of casinos and certain other locations?

So it looks like the gaming areas are excluded, but if its a separate bar with a food license its eliminated. What I don't understand from this description is it sounds like restaurants can still have smoking, but not bars.

Kes,

I read it just the opposite. Bars can allow smoking unless they serve food. I don't think there's too many bars that don't have food.

Ohio passed a state wide smoking ban. AND, the defeated a gambling initiative again.

I read it the way the Senator did; bars can allow smoking if they only serve pre-packaged peanuts and popcorn ... any other food served, and they join the banned group of grocery and convenience stores, malls, restaurants .... and licensed daycare centers. I think most of you know I'm a California smoker (an endangered species<g>), but my feelings are mixed on this. First, what took so long to ban smoking at daycare centers? I really have no problem with not smoking in most of the places listed, but I think the inclusion of bars is more about politics than health.

Strangely enough, here in California, Proposition 86 was defeated ... this would have tacked another $2.60 onto the price of each PACK of cigarettes, with only 10% of the money going to anti-smoking programs. This bill wasn't really about smoking, it was about gouging one group of people to fund a lot of unrelated programs, and I was actually surprised it didn't pass since this type of funding has won in the past. Then again, a lot of former California voters have moved to Nevada.

I believe that smoking is going to be banned in bars IF they serve any food. This is because most of the free standing bars are video poker type bars, and restaurants and families go there to eat. Some of these places actually have separate bars and restaurants and I don't know how those are going to be regulated. The mayor is expressing concern on how this is all to be implemented, and some casinos have their lawyers lined up to sue.....don't know who they are going to sue.....but I think the story is not quite over yet.
I wonder what they will do about the "Gentlemen's Clubs"????????????

As someone who doesn't smoke, I appreciate some of the steps that have been taken to keep the smoke away from us. But I think some of these laws have gone too far. I sincerely believe that a restaurant or bar should be able to have an area for people who want to smoke.

I'm also wondering who those casino lawyers are going to sue. Possibly, there is some poorly written part of the question that can be overturned? I was guessing that the casinos supported Question #5 since it makes the pubs give up either food or smoking gamblers... one way to cut down competition. Do any of our local members know which (if any) Question the casinos supported?

I know the pubs were supporting Question #4, since it would have excluded them, and #4 might have passed if some numbskull hadn't also excluded day care centers ... what the heck were they thinking?

P.S. - Thanks, Mike! I have no desire to blow smoke in anyone's face, but I would like to be able to relax with a cigarette in some small corner of the world.

Daisy, the casinos also supported # 4. It was the health professionals and organizations that were supporting number 5. From what I read, Prop, #4, was put up later than #5, to confuse the issue, and have lesser restrictions. That one said that smoking would be prohibited in day care centers where there were MORE than 13 kids. I guess the first 12 didn't count. Anyway, there were other stipulations as well.
On the television news, there are a lot of interviews of bar employees and owners that are trying to decide whether to give up their food service or not.
You'll have to go have a smoke at one of the pubs with the big red X on them!!!!
(Or you could come to my patio.......but I don't have any poker machines) Restaurants in casinos will be exempted, but now there is some confusion as to what "in the casino" means.

I saw one interview with the Peppermill ... it seemed unbelievable that the Peppermill would stop serving food, but they evidently make more $$ from those smoking gamblers, especially the ones that drink too<g>.

LOL, I like the ambience in your patio .. and we could always take a laptop out there to play poker.

I'm sorry, this law just seems flawed...

I mean, the basic design is wrong. You own a bar and to keep the patrons simi-sober, you serve food. but now, your told by the goverment you will be prosacuted if you serve food and people are smoking?
Maybe I'm just too simple to understand, but if I offer a product that is unexceptable, people won't buy it, and i go out of business. But with this law now, I'm bound by the goverment to obey, and now I've offended the smokers by not allowing thier habit to exist in my bussiness.

Maybe I missed a step here, but this seems like big brother is a little too forward thinking here?
Ok, lets say,,,, I own a business, and lets say, I allow smokers ? if your a non smoker and you enjoy that enveroment, then plaease enjoy your like somewhere else. I clearly stated by my business policys that I don't care what you need, so move along.
Just when and where did goverment not the people, dictate policy?
After 49 other states that bowwed to the loudest voice, I had hopped that LV/NV would have had the balls to stand up and be counted!
BTW this is from a non smoker......

Lee, we are a suburb of California. Left coast mentality strikes again.

Here's an article from the paper this morning:
http://www.reviewjournal.com/lvrj_home/2006/Nov-11-Sat-2006/news/10716060.html
By the way, Lee, technically the government did not dictate this proposal, the people did, and the people voted for it in greater numbers than the people that voted against it. If every registered voter had voted, there might have been a different outcome.........we'll never know, something like 40-50% of registered voters did not bother.........and we had two weeks of PRE Election Day voting, along with regular election day.

That article referenced in Taters note is a great example of how crazy this is.

In my little world, one would make a plan, play it out in their head, play it out on paper, work out the problems, then put it out for a vote. But here, they pick a few points to pull at various heart strings, vote on it, then try to figure out how it supposed to work.

This whole election was a joke. About the only thing that made sense is that Jack Carter wasn't elected.

I don't smoke, so I'm not worried about the limitations. The thing that scares me is that there are some bars in town that have incredible food and it is my suspicion that the food is a loss leader to support the bar. If these bars stop cooking these great meals, Las Vegas will lose another treat...all because some feel good group wants to make a point.

I'm with Lee. If a bar wants to allow smoking, let them do so and reap the rewards or suffer the consequences. Let the consumer vote with their dollars.

I wonder if the bars could call themselves private clubs, sell free memberships, and be allowed to operate as they wish?

Alaska is looking better everyday.

Just hours before the smoking ban was to go into effect, a Clark County judge has "questioned" the constituionality of the rule. At this point there is a 15 day hold, there are a number of possibilities that could come out in the final ruling. The law MIGHT not ever go into effect here, or it might go on as passed by the voters.

This hold is only effective for Clark County. The rest of the state and the Las Vegas airport will follow the laws starting Friday morning.

Ohio passed a state wide smoking ban also. One of the big discussions right now has to do with truck drivers. Apparently the law considers the cab of a company owned truck to be an extension of their office and you can't smoke there.

How dumb can these thing get?

What if you run a home based business?

Let's consider the California town of Belmont in the last election; you can't smoke except in your home, and neither your back yard or a privately owned car is considered an extension of your home<g>.

Here's our latest:

It's still not legal to smoke in public places in Ohio, but the state said Thursday that it won't do much about it if any business establishment allows you to - at least for the next few months.

The state of Ohio agreed Thursday not to enforce its new indoor-smoking ban until specific rules and regulations go into effect. The decision was made after settlement talks between the Ohio Attorney General's office and lawyers for two groups that had filed suits challenging the constitutionality of the new Smoke Free Workplace Act..

My favorite is the new smoking ban in Washington DC, in all public places. Our esteemed Congress exempted their own work spaces and meeting halls.