Experts differ on whether Howard County?s new smoking ban might keep new bars away while prompting more family restaurants to open.
“I think it means great growth for the restaurant and bar industry on the whole,” said, Glenn E. Schneider, legislative chairman for Smoke Free Howard County, a volunteer organization based in Columbia that supported the ban.
The new law, which went into effect Tuesday, prohibits smoking at public meetings, workplaces, newly opened restaurants and bars, concerts, sports events and events such as firework displays and festivals. Restaurants and bars with smoking sections have until June 1 to comply.
With the ban, fewer bars may open, and new casual dining establishments could increase, said Melvin Thompson, vice president of government affairs for the Maryland Restaurant Association, a state trade group that opposed the ban.
This could tip the balance of new restaurants. More pubs and sports bars along the Route 1 corridor, for example, and these areas are likely to see a dip in new bars.
