Council to reconsider smoking ban in city

Champaign smokers that thought their butts were safe could be in for a surprise May 16, when a proposed ban on smoking in restaurants and bars will come before the Champaign City Council for a second time.

Councilman Geraldo Rosales said the ban, which was pronounced "dead" by Councilwoman Kathy Ennen when it failed a study session poll in September, would appear on the regular council agenda in two weeks - and this time it could have enough votes to pass.

Usually, when a bill fails a study session poll, it never makes it onto a regular agenda. But Rosales circulated a petition among the council members that successfully revived the issue.

"If it fails, six months later we will propose it again, and we'll keep proposing it until somebody breaks or we get a new council," Rosales said.

The September proposal originally called only for a ban on smoking in restaurants, but supporters amended it to include both restaurants and bars when several council members questioned the distinction between the two in the city's liquor codes. That cost them the vote of Councilwoman Gina Jackson, who did not want to include military veterans' clubs in the ban, and the proposal lost 5-4.

But Rosales said he believed Jackson had changed her mind and would support a full ban. If she and Ennen, who in September voted first for the ban and then later to dismiss it, both vote for the bill it would likely have the necessary majority to pass into law.

Mayor Gerald Schweighart, a longtime opponent of any form of the smoking ban, said only that he had "heard rumors" that it would resurface on May 16.