Is It Time To Ban Lighting Up?

Jen Overlease

     The tobacco free policy for Montana Tech is well underway, but how well are the students and faculty adjusting to the new policy?

    Not well it seems. While some students and employees are complying with the policy, there are a number of students who continue using tobacco on campus.

    Janice Immonen, a non-smoking senior, is noticing other students smoking on school grounds more and more each day. “All the smoking ban did is encourage littering, I see cigarette butts everywhere on the tiers now,” she said. “People are just smoking on different parts of the campus now.”

    Robert Emerick, a non-smoker working in dining and catering services, loves the new tobacco free policy. “Every smoker I work with is taking fewer breaks now, since they have to walk two blocks off-campus just to have a cigarette.” He added that the crew seemed more productive in the kitchen with less breaks, and how their supervisor made it clear to the crew the tobacco policy is strictly enforced.

    The ban has pushed smoking employees, faculty and staff to the outskirts of campus. The closest off-campus site is Granite Street, located directly north of the ELC building. There are no sidewalks along that street or ashtrays for cigarette butts.

  Do you wonder how this policy will be enforced?

    In order to employ this ban, campus administrators are relying on students and faculty to enforce it by “informing and educating others in a respectful manner.”

     So if someone is caught smoking, the students or faculty should politely remind that person of the school’s policy. If they continue to smoke, filling out A Tobacco Free Incident Referral Form is suggested. This form is completed, signed, and forwarded to the Chancellor’s office.

So far, enforcement of the tobacco ban is severely lacking, and the consequences for students caught using tobacco on campus are uncertain. Since the tobacco ban is self-policing, it is unlikely anyone will take the time to fill in a referral form on any one smoker and turn it in to the Chancellor. I don’t know anybody who likes to tattle on others!

   A note from the editor: I personally live in the off-campus apartments run by Montana Tech and am not a smoker. However, I feel that the smoking ban for anywhere on the premises (this includes the parking lot, decks, and the grassy walkways) that is built into our lease is a bit ridiculous. While I understand no smoking in the apartments, and maybe even the on-campus ban, the apartments are not “on-campus.” (Just ask all the students that were kicked out of the dorms because the board asked that all freshmen be housed ”on-campus”) The fact that a smoker can’t walk out into open air off-campus where it won’t affect the property nor should be influenced by the “on-campus smoking ban” is, in my humble opinion, an infringements on the rights of the apartment dwellers who moved off campus to seek a less restrictive environment only to find their civil rights at home just as limited as their civil rights on campus.