The sponsor of a bill that would ban smoking in Atlantic City casinos said the measure will be punted to the next legislative session after a new group of lawmakers are sworn in.
The bipartisan bill, S264, would eliminate exemptions to the 2006 New Jersey Smoke-Free Air Act for casinos and simulcast facilities to the law, which banned smoking in indoor public spaces. The bill has 26 co-sponsors, and a companion bill in the Assembly has 57 co-sponsors.
New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy has said he will sign any casino smoking ban that reaches his desk.
The bill was first slated for debate and a vote in the Senate Health, Human Services and Senior Citizens Committee on December 7, when dealers from the Atlantic City casinos joined anti-smoking advocates to pack the chamber room in anticipation of a vote.
At the last minute, though, the committee’s chairman, state Senator Joseph Vitale, said the measure was one vote short of the support required to move the bill to the floor.
He also said the committee will now consider alternatives to a total ban being pushed by the casino operators, including enclosed “Philip Morris smoking rooms”—separate rooms including slots and tables where smoking would be permitted and where employees would volunteer to work.
Last week, the bill’s lead sponsor, Senator Joe Vitale, said the bill will be pulled from consideration until the next session.
“We’ll get there eventually,” Vitale said at the committee’s Thursday meeting, one of the last in the lame-duck session of the legislature. “This will pass, and we’ll take it up in a new session with new members.”
Sen. Vince Polistina, a Republican who represents Atlantic City, supports a new bill including the smoking room proposal. He said he intends to introduce a compromise bill during the next legislative session “to get us to the point where we eliminate smoking on the casino floor,” he said, according to the New Jersey Monitor. “The reality is, we don’t have the support in the Legislature to get it over the finish line. At the end of the day, this is headed to a compromise anyway.”
Casino Employees Against Smoking Effects (CEASE), the group of Atlantic City employees that has joined the national group Americans for Nonsmokers’ Rights in pushing the elimination of the smoking loophole, was quick to assail the bill’s shelving,
“When the rubber met the road and New Jersey Senator Vince Polistina had the chance today to vote to advance legislation out of committee to protect casino workers’ lives, he failed to do so, as Politico reported today,” CEASE said in a statement issued the evening of Vitale’s announcement.
“He has been with us at rallies for the last two-and-a-half years, he’s said all the right things, and he was supposed to be there for us when the rubber met the road. Instead, he’s MIA.”
The statement urged Senate President Nick Scutari to send the bill directly to the floor before the lame-duck session ends.
CEASE also cited the results of a new online poll by Washington, D.C.-based Normington Petts that found nearly three-quarters of Philadelphia-area adults would visit Atlantic City casinos more if they were 100 percent smoke-free.
“These data indicate that not only will Atlantic City not lose its customer base, but tourism could actually increase if casinos were smoke free,” said Jill Normington, a partner at the polling and campaign strategy firm, according to The Press of Atlantic City.
CEASE presented the poll results as directly contradicting the main argument of industry operators that banning smoking would lead to revenue declines and even the closing of some Atlantic City casinos.
