The Leader

[Click to enlarge]

An initiative to make the UWM campus completely smoke-free has already been endorsed by the Physical Environment Committee (PEC) and garnered support from Chancellor Carlos Santiago, but campus police will be unable to enforce the ban unless a change is made to the state laws governing campus police departments.

Before the Union Policy Board voted in February to ban smoking in the building, confusion existed over whether campus police could legitimately enforce a ban. Although one section of Chapter 18 of Wisconsin State statutes allows for enforcing a ban on smoking in all but designated areas, another contradicting law forbids UW police departments from enforcing campus signage.

"Allowing smoking in the Union was under a statutory exception that permitted a building authority to allow smoking in designated areas, and the Union Policy Board has revoked that exception," Joely Urdan, UWM associate counsel and university legal counsel, said.

Lt. Ernest Meress of the UWM Police Department said that once the Board revoked the smoking exception the police were able to enforce the ban; to his knowledge, however, no tickets have been issued for violating the policy. Meress said that the police decided to try and educate students for a first warning and only write tickets for multiple offenders.

The PEC has endorsed a four-phase plan to eliminate smoking on campus. Phase 1, which is ongoing, is an educational outreach by the PEC on the health implications of smoking. Making the Union smoke-free was stage two, and stage three, enforcement of the current policy forbidding smoking within 30 feet of any campus building, will begin July 1. Stage four, a complete ban on smoking anywhere on campus, it set to take place on July 1, 2007.

"I think the environment and the climate is changing for people tolerating tobacco smoke," said Dr. Barbara Moser, director of health education and quality improvement at the Norris Health Center. "People don't want to inhale it anymore. We are hoping that campus citizens will respect that."

Because both the 30-foot and campus-wide bans are campus initiatives, Chapter 18 does not allow any enforcement mechanisms for the campus police, according to Vice Chancellor for Administrative Affairs Sherwood Wilson.

Robin Van Harpen, interim director of university legal and senior university legal counsel, said that UWM police can only enforce violations of state and municipal laws as well as Board of Regents Regulations. State laws do not provide for a citation for smoking outdoors, Van Harpen said, but change could be on the way.

"The UW System is reviewing Chapter 17 and 18 together, and my understanding is that one of the changes they are considering includes adding a provision for the police to enforce posted signage," Van Harpen said, adding that strides are being made at the campus level to ensure that the ban goes forward. Besides working with Norris to educate the campus about the dangers of smoking, the PEC is looking at a range of enforcement options.

"The ban may be currently unenforceable by the police, but there are other disciplinary procedures for students and staff," Van Harpen said.

Wilson agreed, but said that the ban will most likely go over well with students. When Wilson was a university administrator in Ohio, the campus community embraced a decision by city leaders to go smoke-free.

"There was a lot of discussion and debate, but once it took effect there were not many problems," Wilson said.

One potential conflict, Moser said, could be the decision by students to go across the street to smoke and leave cigarette butts on people's lawns.

"We have to be sensitive to our neighbors," Moser said.

Van Harpen said she is unsure when a decision by the UW System would be made over the proposed changes.

Article Tools