Allan Appel Photo
A sign of the future.
As a federal official announced a proposed ban on smoking in all public-housing developments, some New Haven tenants said they aren’t ready to butt out in the privacy of their homes.
They may not have a choice, if federal Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Secretary Julián Castro prevails with the proposed rule change he announced Thursday.
Castro’s proposed new rule (read it here) would ban “lit tobacco products (cigarettes, cigars or pipes) in all living units, indoor common areas, administrative offices and all outdoor areas within 25 feet of housing and administrative office buildings” at all public-housing developments nationwide. He said the move would save local housing authorities $153 million a year in health, repair and fire-damage costs and improve the health of the nation’s more than 760,000 public-housing tenants.
The public can comment on the rule for the next 60 days, after which point agencies like the Housing Authority of New Haven (HANH) would have 18 months to fully implement it. (HUD spokeswoman Rhonda Siciliano told the Independent that the rule would apply to HANH-run developments, not to privately-owned complexes with Section 8 subsidized tenants.) It is nto yet decided whether HUD will ban e‑cigarettes.
HANH Executive Director Karen DuBois-Walton said her agency surveyed tenants on the subject, and found them “pretty split” between smokers wanting the freedom to light up in their homes and others wanting a cleaner, more healthful living environment.
“I’m torn between wanting to do things that promote people’s health and having people being able to do what they like in their homes as long as it’s legal in compliance. The issue with smoke is it’s hard to contain,” said DuBois-Walton, noting that smoke from a public-housing tenant living one floor above sometimes creeps into her HANH office.
HANH has gotten a start on a smoke-free policy by banning smoking at one development, Dixwell’s Monterey Place, this August. A citywide ban would require spreading the ban to all 23 complexes citywide, and spark some pushback, based on reactions of tenants interviewed Thursday at four HANH developments.
Tenants generally approved of a ban in some public spaces at their developments, but many took exception to rules limiting what they do legally inside their apartments.
Smoker Leaves Monterey In Huff
The most positive reaction came from where the idea has become reality, not theory: Monterey.
Three women in the laundry room praised the air they are breathing as a result of the new ban. Naomi Tisdale (pictured) said other developments will benefit from following suit. “I think it works well. I don’t see anyone smoking outside or in the building,” she said.
A friend, who declined to be identified, but who has lived at Monterey Place for 15 years, endorsed the no-smoking policy as well. She told a personal story. She suffers now, she said from COPD, or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, following a lifetime of smoking. When she moved into Monterey Place, people smoked and her COPD had not presented itself. She blamed, in part, the second-hand smoke that was all around for her subsequent disease.
Still, the sentiments were not unanimous.
Deborah Byas spent an hour filling out forms applying for residence there Thursday. She said she had not been told of the no-smoking policy, though signs displayed prominently throughout the development’s attractive streets declare it.
As she sat in her car outside the management offices and chatted with an employee smoking in the middle of the street, Byas expressed dismay, and not a little anger. In fact, on hearing of the ban, she said, “I’m not moving here. You got people disabled, for them to come down to smoke, and they can’t! I should be able to do what I want in my house. I’m not messing with these folks. I’m going to withdraw” the application, she said as she drove off.
Enforcement Challenge
Sammie Williams, a five-year resident at Ruppolo Manor complex for seniors and the disabled on Ferry Street in Fair Haven, enthusiastically endorsed the idea of a smoking ban not only on the grounds and all public areas inside and out of his apartment complex, but within individual apartments as well.
Smoke doesn’t stay in an individual apartment, noted the lifelong non-smoker. “It will get in the next apartment, it comes through the doors.”
Juanita Mims, a 15-year resident, is a smoker. She offered a different take while doing her stint Thursday at the security table in the Ruoppolo lobby.
“All the public areas should be smoke free. But you should smoke in your own house if you want to,” argued Mims, who said she uses the balcony on her apartment to indulge. “I smoke on the back porch” so the the walls and curtains won’t smell, she added.
Standing nearby was Mary Swain, a six-year resident of Ruppolo. “There’s a lot more that kills people around here than cigarettes,” she said.
As to smoking within the apartments, “you can put fans in that pull out the smoke,” she argued
At Eastview Terrace in Fair Haven Heights, Antoinette Ferris and her brother were visiting their mom, a smoker who has lived there for three years.
“That’s crazy. What’s the point of paying your rent if you can’t smoke!” Ferris exclaimed. On the other hand, she endorsed a ban on smoking on the grounds and the parking lot, where she sat in the car waiting for her brother.
A neighbor, Jeanette Echevaria, agreed. A recent arrival from the Church Street South complex and a non-smoker and the mother of an asthmatic child, Echevaria nevertheless empathized with the plight of smokers. “Someone smoking for 30 or 40 years and you tell them in their own house they can’t smoke!” she said rhetorically. “I don’t think that makes sense. And it’s not fair. Inside your house you should be free.”
She said that while she doesn’t tolerate smoking around her kid, “in the common areas there should be definite designated areas” for smokers.
Echevaria also questioned how a non-smoking rule within apartments could ever be enforced. “That’s crazy!” she said at the prospect.
“Enforcing is going to be difficult,” agreed HANH chief DuBois-Walton. She said HANH is looking for an agency to help launch a smoking cessation program to get tenants started. “Let’s do it in a planful way that enables people to quit this habit,” she said.
Over at 360 Orange St., which doubles as HANH headquarters and the Charles McQueeney tower for the elderly and disabled, a recently arrived resident, Erasma Lopez, pronounced the idea of a ban on smoking in public areas good, but insufficient.
“I don’t smoke, and I have asthma,” she said as she was leaving her building. She complained about smoking at bus stops, turning this way and that to show the difficulty of escaping the secondhand smoke. “It’s everywhere you turn,” she said, arguing those areas should be smoke free, too.
Want to comment on the proposed rule? Here’s how: “[S]ubmit comments electronically through the Federal eRulemaking Portal [here]. Comments may be submitted by mail to the Regulations Divisions, Office of General Counsel, Department of Housing and Urban Development, 451 7th Street SW, Room 10276, Washington, DC 20410.”
Paul Bass contributed reporting.