Kaine, GOP agree on smoking ban

RICHMOND | Gov. Tim Kaine and House Republican leaders announced an agreement Thursday on a bill that would curb smoking in most public eateries and bars.

The bill represents a compromise between the Democratic governor’s longtime backing for an outright ban on all smoking in bars and restaurants and traditional Republican opposition to mandated smoking restrictions.

If passed, the measure will ban smoking except in private clubs and inside walled-off areas of restaurants designated for smoking and served by a ventilation system separate from the one that serves nonsmoking parts of the establishment.

In announcing the accord, House Speaker William J. Howell, Stafford Republican, said the bipartisan compromise was off to a good start.

“The big difference this time is both sides were willing to yield,” he said.

For years, bills to ban or curb smoking have failed to clear the House, victims of the muscular tobacco lobby in a capital city that is home to the world’s largest cigarette manufacturing plant.

This year at least 10 proposed smoking ban bills were introduced.

“It’s not a perfect bill - compromises aren’t perfect - but a very good bill,” Mr. Kaine said at a news conference about the agreement.

House General Laws Committee Chairman S. Chris Jones, Suffolk Republican, said a total smoking ban never would make it out of his committee. The committee was expected to take up the bill Thursday afternoon.

Mr. Howell, however, would not predict final passage.

“There are people who are going to continue to oppose it,” he said. “I’m never confident down here.”

The tobacco industry and its most politically influential constituent, cigarette giant Philip Morris, are working to defeat the compromise.

“Every restaurant already has the right to ban smoking without the government mandating it,” said David Sutton, a spokesman for Altria, Philip Morris’ corporate parent. “A ban that treats all restaurants the same makes no sense.”

Mr. Kaine said Philip Morris and tobacco interests were taking part in negotiations toward smoking restrictions until mid-November, when they abruptly broke off from talks.

“… They came to me and said ‘You guys do your work and we’ll do our work,’ ” Mr. Kaine said. “They said they were comfortable it’s going to work out the way we want and we don’t need to be involved in the dialogue.”

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