Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine on Tuesday announced his latest attempt to ban smoking in bars and restaurants statewide, arguing new momentum is behind the measure that died quietly in the Republican-led House last year.
This is the third consecutive year Kaine will attempt to push through the ban, which he said 28 other states have enacted. The District’s smoking ban went into effect in January 2007.
“I think it is time, and even past time, for Virginia to join those states,” Kaine said at the smoke-free Liberty Tavern in Arlington.
The governor, who enters the final regular legislative session of his term next week, said public consensus on the danger of secondhand smoke gives the bill better chances this year, as will a new House policy that prevents bills from dying in unrecorded subcommittee votes.
A subcommittee of the House General Laws Committee killed a bundle of anti-smoking measures last year. Kaine said some lawmakers didn’t want the ban to reach the floor for an up-or-down vote.
Republican lawmakers, who remain in control of the House of Delegates, are likely to again fight the proposal this year.
Del. Jeff Frederick, R-Woodbridge, said he hates cigarette smoke and doesn’t allow it in his house. But restaurants and bars, he said, should have the same right to decide for themselves whether they want to allow smoking.
“I think that’s a fundamental right we should preserve for business owners,” said Frederick, chairman of the Virginia Republican Party.
Kaine, facing a $3 billion budget shortfall, also is proposing a 30-cent per pack cigarette tax increase to help offset the costs of Medicaid. That measure, too, will be fought by the House GOP.
Legislation that hampers tobacco use has traditionally had a tough time in Richmond, the home of tobacco giant Philip Morris.
