Somebar and restaurant owners fear a loss of business as Howard County joins three other Maryland counties with a smoking ban.
But a 2002 study, the most recent report by the national nonprofit Americans for Nonsmokers? Rights, states that “smoke-free laws generally had no statistically significant effect” when restaurant and bar sales were compared in areas with and without smoking bans.
“Hundreds of municipalities and 13 states across the country have enacted similar legislation and we do not see widespread economic impact,” said Glenn Schneider, legislative chairman for Smoke Free Howard County, a local advocacy group.
But Restaurant Association of Maryland Vice President Melvin Thompson called those assertions “total hogwash.”
He said the ANR report results are skewed because they include businesses that are already smoke-free, including fast-food restaurants and doughnut shops.
Only 17 percent of businesses in Howard County allow smoking, he said.
In only two weeks after the ban passed in Montgomery County, revenue and customer traffic in Champions Billiards Sports Cafe in Rockville decreased about 20 percent, said manager George Atiako.
Atiako, a nonsmoker who strongly disagrees with the ban, said it is closing established businesses.
“I know a couple businesses that will be shut down, like Anchor [Inn] in Wheaton, and they have been here for like 50 years,” Atiako said.
But restaurateurs such as Olga Yarmilik, manager of the Red Star Tavern in Largo, have had little problems adjusting to the ban and maintaining revenue and sales.
“When we tell people they can?t smoke, they just say, ?Oh, really? I didn?t know that.? We never had a case where people got rowdy or ugly when we told them.”
