EDITORIAL: Indiana Senate should OK smoking ban

This could be, and should be, the year for Indiana to finally adopt a ban on smoking in public places.

State Rep. Charlie Brown, D-Gary, has made this smoking ban one of his primary pursuits, and for good reason.

Everyone knows the harmful effects of smoking. If it harms the smoker, well, the smoker knew what the risks were before lighting up. But nonsmokers deserve protection from those noxious fumes.

Combine the studies showing secondhand smoke's effects on lung cancer and heart disease, and a total of around 50,000 Americans die each year because of someone else's smoking habit.

The major obstacle to adopting a local ban on smoking is business owners' fear that customers who smoke would go to a competitor in a nearby community instead. But if a statewide ban is put in place, that would no longer be a problem.

With the exception of Kentucky, a tobacco-producing state which isn't known for being a bastion of healthy lifestyles anyway, Indiana is encircled by states with smoking bans. In fact, Indiana is one of only 11 states with no statewide ban on smoking in public places indoors.

Even within Indiana, smoking bans are in place in many localities.

In Northwest Indiana, Chesterton, Crown Point, Lowell and Valparaiso have smoking bans in place. Just last week, the new Tri-Township Consolidated School Corp. in LaPorte County adopted a no-smoking policy for school buildings, buses and grounds.

Now that House Bill 1149, which would ban smoking in public, has passed the House, it faces a vote today before the Senate Public Policy Committee. Brown said committee Chairman Ron Alting, R-Lafayette, has assured him the legislation will be sent the Senate floor.

"It may not get out in its current form, but it will get out of committee," Brown told Times Statehouse Bureau Chief Dan Carden recently.

Gov. Mitch Daniels has said he hopes the General Assembly will send him a bill with as few exemptions as possible. The Senate should do just that.

The Senate has extinguished the proposed smoking ban five times before. This year, it should approve it.

For the sake of Hoosiers whose life is harmed by secondary smoke, make the smoking ban happen.