Speak up! California smokefree bill has next hearing tomorrow

Publication Date: 2011-06-21

Senate Bill 575, to close loopholes in California’s smokefree workplace law, will be heard Wednesday June 22, in the Assembly Committee on Labor and Employment.  After, the bill will also be heard by the Committee on Government Operations. The bill will close loopholes that allow smoking in small workplaces and public places, such as in businesses with five or fewer employees, owner-operated workplaces, warehouses, employee break rooms, and hotel lobbies.

1) Please contact your Assembly member TODAY if he/she is on the Committee on Labor and Employment to ask them to vote YES on Senate Bill 575 to remove outdated exemptions and let more California workers can breathe easy on the job.

Committee members’ districts and contact information:

2) Even if your Assembly Member isn’t on this Committee, please contact your Assembly member to let them know you support smokefree air for all Californian workers, and that no one deserves to be left behind from smokefree air protections.

Whether you call or email, here are some talking points:

• Please support Senate Bill 575. Californians health is suffering from breathing secondhand smoke on the job or working next door to a business that allows smoking.
• All Californians deserve to breathe safe, smokefree air in their workplace.
• No one should have to choose between their health and their paycheck.
• California lags behind 23 other states and hundreds of communities with stronger smokefree laws that more effectively protect their employees and the public.
• California needs to regain its leadership and bring its smokefree workplace protections up to 2011 standards.
• Smokefree air is good for health and good for business.  Predictions of economic doom from smokefree laws simply do not come true, whether it was in the 1990s when restaurants and bars went smokefree or today in 2011.

Did you know?

The 2005 California Tobacco Survey found that 14% of California’s workforce reported being exposed to secondhand smoke on the job. This includes:

• 29.7% with a household income of $10,001 to $20,000
• 44% with a household income of $20,001 to $30,000
• 24.3% of 18 to 24 year olds
• 23.3% of Latinos

Even if you aren’t personally exposed to tobacco smoke on the job, many other Californians are suffering from exposure, and we all need to speak up for everyone’s right to breathe smokefree air.