Smoking People Rate in Jefferson County, Smoking Areas

The 'smoking booth" outside the Jefferson County courthouse is a busy place.Smokers huddle beneath it when it rains. On pleasant days, they stand around its edges, surrounded by a cigarette haze. A mix of visitors and courthouse employees converge for smoke breaks. Numbers released last week by the University of Wisconsin Population Health Institute and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation explain the booth's popularity. In Jefferson County, 30 percent of adults smoke. That's well above the national average of 19 percent and the 24 percent of Missourians who light up.

Sentiment among county residents has historically leaned toward a fear of government overreach and intrusion on personal choices.

"They like to choose what they want to do and don't want to do out here," said Linda Coker, a courthouse employee taking a smoke break on a recent day. And smoking isn't as frowned upon as it is elsewhere.

"I think it's more socially acceptable here and part of the norm," said Chrissy Oberle, health education coordinator of the Jefferson County Health Department.

Her department offers smoking cessation classes, but one in January was canceled when only two people showed up. Other recent classes have been held.

And while other local cities and counties grapple with smoking bans, governing boards in Jefferson County seldom, if ever, debate whether to curtail smoking.

Only the city of Arnold has attempted to limit smoking — in restaurants — and the City Council has been backpedaling ever since.

David Venable, who authored Arnold's ban when he was a councilman there, said his motivation to write the ban came from a group of senior citizens who had trouble breathing in smoky restaurants.

Venable, who now lives in Pevely and has a hearing-impaired daughter, said he didn't anticipate the level of hostility his idea would cause. People came out of their houses to scream and curse at him, he said.

"It got to the point I was thankful my daughter was deaf," he said, so she didn't have to listen to the horrible things people said to him.

In July 2004, Arnold council members voted to ban smoking in bars and restaurants that took in less than 70 percent of their sales from alcohol. But weeks later, the city amended the ordinance to allow smoking in walled-off, separately ventilated areas where alcohol was served.
After more contention, the council voted in February 2006 to allow restaurants the option of adding a smoking room, regardless of whether they served alcohol.

Smoking is not allowed in restaurants that have an attached bar, but restaurants with at least 50 seats can allow smoking in a separate room. The smoking room's heating, ventilation and air-conditioning system must be separate from the system that serves the rest of the restaurant.
Smoking bans in St. Louis and St. Louis County exempt a few businesses, such as casinos and bars in which food service is a small part of their total business. Tougher city bans with no exemptions for bars are in place in Clayton, Brentwood, Creve Coeur, Kirkwood and Ballwin.