Just before midnight, smokers savored their last puffs in barrooms across Maryland. Viken Guiragossian, a bartender at the Crease in Towson, lamented the end of a long tradition of sipping a beer
and dragging on a smoke.
“It feels like they are taking another right away,” he said.
Others, like Sierra Robinson, a non-smoking student at Towson University, welcomed the ban.
“Things will taste better and things will smell better, and it will be a lot more enjoyable going out,”Robinson said.
The indoor smoking ban, which took effect Friday, drew widely varying views among patrons who packed bars.
“It will be nice to go out and not have your hair smell like cigarettes,” said Lexi DeAngelis, a non-smoking senior at TU.
Even some occasional smokers supported the ban. “I was a social smoker; now, I wont have the temptation anymore,” said Thomas Oliver, a bartender at the Melting Pot.
A non-smoker, Brian Fisher, a promoter of bars and clubs in Towson and Baltimore, said he doesn?t much like second-hand smoke.
But of the ban, he said, “It?s bad for business, period. If cigarette smoke is what makes me money, then I don?t mind.”
Don Stifler, a part-owner of Little Dickies in Towson, believes the ban will hurt business, but only for about a month. “People will come back,” he said. “People don’t come to drink and smoke. They come to socialize.”
Some businesses that had gone smoke-free weeks ago said doing so had little effect on business.
“It hasn’t hurt us whatsoever,” said Marianne Cook, an employee of Bahama Breeze, which banned smoking Jan. 1.
Some critics predicted smokers would huddle outside bar doorways — and leave their butts behind.
“It’s no big deal sending people outside, but who?s going to pick up all the butts on the street?” said Kirstian Baumann, a bartender at Charles Village Pub in Towson.
Others said the government should butt out.
“I think it’s not the government?s place to tell people where they can and cannot smoke,” said Brett Rubin, a non-smoking student at TU.
“I don’t think the government should regulate businesses and tell them how to run,” said Scott Musser, a non-smoker.
As an occasional social smoker, John Lewis, a senior at Towson University, supports the new law. “I’ll be looking forward to going to the bars and being able to breathe more clearly,” Lewis said. “Smokers or not, the new law will probably benefit everybody.”
