“It’s a lot easier to be a tobacco-free park,” said John Gentry, director of Oconee County Parks and Recreation Department.
The county’s Citizens Advisory Committee on Recreational Affairs recently suggested the policy change to commissioners. Oconee County currently has tobacco zones in its public parks where people can go to smoke cigarettes or use smokeless tobacco, but that arrangement confuses people, Gentry said.
“I think one of the comments from staff was, ‘If (New York City’s) Central Park can be tobacco-free, why can’t we?’,” he said.
Several area counties already have non-smoking policies for their parks. Athens-Clarke County commissioners voted to prohibit smoking in county parks in July 2005. “If you’re walking on the greenway, (or) if you’re walking your dog in the park, you cannot smoke,” said Cathy Padgett, spokeswoman for Athens-Clarke County’s Leisure Services Department. “I think it’s overall trying to promote a healthy community (and) that’s a goal for local parks.”
In Oconee County, adopting a tobacco-free policy likely won’t affect softball games or baseball tournaments, but it could have an impact on the rodeo tournaments the county hosts, Gentry said.
People have stressed stopping the use of smokeless tobacco products in some sports, like softball and baseball, while tobacco use in other sports isn’t similarly addressed, he said.
“What we have seen is that there is not an issue (of tobacco use) in baseball and softball games and tournaments because of the amount of education that has occurred around the game. You see it in professional (ball) games, all the way down to our local high school games. Whereas, in our rodeo events and similar type of agricultural events we haven’t seen the same sort of education directed at that clientele,” Gentry said.
Commissioners plan to discuss the tobacco-free policy proposal at their next meeting, set for 7 p.m. Tuesday.
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