No more butts on the beach, N.J. Legislature says
TRENTON - New Jersey lawmakers, undeterred by a likely veto from Gov. Christie, voted Thursday to ban smoking in public parks and beaches statewide.
TRENTON - New Jersey lawmakers, undeterred by a likely veto from Gov. Christie, voted Thursday to ban smoking in public parks and beaches statewide.
The Senate voted in favor of the legislation, 24-6, and the Assembly voted 63-7 with four abstentions.
Christie vetoed a similar bill in 2014, arguing that such policy-making should be left to local officials.
At the time, he said 12 counties and more than 240 municipalities had banned smoking in parks, while 12 towns had declared beaches smoke-free areas.
"The problem I have is, why shouldn't municipalities be able to make these decisions?" Christie said Wednesday night on the 101.5 radio program Ask the Governor. "Some have, but not all of them have done what some liberals in the Legislature want them to do, so therefore the big hand of the state comes in."
The bill would extend the "New Jersey Smoke Free Air Act," a 2006 law that prohibited smoking in indoor public places, to outdoor public spaces. It would allow for designated smoking areas on beaches and golf courses. The ban would apply to electronic smoking devices.
With Memorial Day weekend approaching, "you're going to see people treating the beach like an ashtray again," Senate President Stephen Sweeney (D., Gloucester) told reporters. "Just because it's sand doesn't mean you just drop your butts in it."
Violators would face the same fines established under the 2006 law: $250 for the first offense, then $500, and $1,000 for each subsequent violation.
The legislation would take effect six months after enactment.
An affiliate of the American Cancer Society praised the bill's passage. "It's disappointing that parents taking their children to the beach currently have to do so in an environment that potentially puts their health in danger and encourages a deadly habit," Ethan Hasbrouck, a lobbyist for the group, said in a statement.
"Smoking in such settings not only threatens others with secondhand smoke, it puts roadblocks in front of those trying to quit and also encourages nonsmokers to start," he said.
The Senate on Thursday also voted, 23-14, to raise the smoking age in New Jersey from 19 to 21. The only other states to enact such legislation are Hawaii and California, according to bill sponsors. The full Assembly has yet to vote on the measure.
Christie did not take action on a bill to raise the smoking age during the legislative session that ended in January, effectively killing it.
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Staff writer Maddie Hanna contributed to this article.