Fighting to make more casinos smoke free is like chipping away at a boulder, Bronson Frick says. Small cracks here and there eventually yield success.
Advocates of a proposal to ban smoking from Pennsylvania’s gaming floors, one of the state’s last public areas or workplaces where it’s allowed, hope they made a chip with a small rally Thursday outside Rivers Casino Pittsburgh, site of the Summer Meeting of the National Council of Legislators from Gaming States (NCLGS).
State Rep. Dan Frankel (D-Pittsburgh) said the legislature is “on the cusp” of approving his oft-introduced measure to ban smoking at all Pennsylvania casinos. Frankel, who fought numerous exemptions built into the 2008 law that banned most public-area smoking statewide, said allowing smoking on 50 percent of the gaming floors exposes workers to dangerous secondhand smoke. For the first time, his proposal to eliminate the casino exemption made it out of committee this year, but it has not been put up for a floor vote. Frankel said the proposal would gain “overwhelming” bipartisan support in the full House and Senate.
“Casino operators understand, I think, what is taking place in terms of jeopardizing the health of their workers,” Frankel said. “And we know that also it’s basically exploiting people who have an addiction to gambling and an addiction to smoking. There is a comorbidity issue.”
About 20 people attended the rally, sponsored by the state’s chapter of Casino Employees Against Smoking’s Effects (CEASE), United Auto Workers (UAW) Region 9, and Americans for Nonsmokers’ Rights (ANR). The UAW represents casino employees in New Jersey and other states.
In addition to Pennsylvania, legislatures in New Jersey, Rhode Island, and Kansas considered bills this year to remove the casino exemption from their clean-indoor-air laws. The smoking issue was not on the NCLGS agenda and no legislator other than Frankel attended the rally. About 300 legislators and regulators representing numerous states are attending the NCLGS meeting.
Frick, the ANR Foundation’s director of advocacy, said the fight for smoke-free casino air continues outside legislatures as well. The recently released schedule for October’s Global Gaming Expo in Las Vegas includes a panel discussion “Insights from Non-Smoking Casino Initiatives.” Last year’s G2E featured the event’s first panel on smoking, and landing a return engagement is a promising sign, he said.
Frick said ANR plans to again ask shareholders in Bally’s Corp., Caesars Entertainment, and Boyd Gaming to authorize a study of the costs of their current policies allowing smoking. The nonbinding proposals were presented for the first time earlier this year, with each getting about 20 percent shareholder approval. “In some ways, the success is when we can withdraw their proposal from the ballot if the company agrees to engage in dialogues in an immediate and meaningful way,” Frick said. That happened with MGM Resorts International and he called the ensuing discussions “constructive.”
“Our goal isn’t to be adversarial,” he added. “It’s to help the industry …embrace these policies as good for business.”
