No Smoking! Majority of New Yorkers Like Smoke-Free Living

The majority of New Yorkers would actually like to live in smoke-free buildings, according to a new Quinnipiac University poll,

The neighbors are not fans (AMagill, flickr)

The majority of New Yorkers would actually like to live in smoke-free buildings, according to a new Quinnipiac University poll, they just don’t like Mayor Bloomberg telling them what to do.

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Although 59 percent of New Yorkers told pollsters that they wanted to live in a building where no one was allowed to smoke, another 53 percent thought that city hall shouldn’t pressure co-ops, condos or apartment buildings to ban smoking.

Basically, no one likes a nanny state, even when they like everything the nanny does.

Of course, Mayor Bloomberg has insisted that the new law he’s been pushing wouldn’t force buildings to ban smoking, it would just require them to disclose their smoking policies and procedures to potential tenants and renters.

“We protect people from hurting themselves if they’re trying to jump off a bridge, we restrain them,” Mr. Bloomberg told The New York Times when he announced his policy proposal last month. “Should you really do it with smoking? We’re not going to do it with smoking, but we—this is purely an informational thing.”

Women are bigger fans than men of smoke free buildings, (63 percent to 55 percent), although not by much, according to the poll, and even though people don’t really like the idea of the Bloomberg administration nosing into their apartment buildings, 45 percent said that the mayor’s steps to improve the health habits of city residents were “about right.” Still, 33 percent felt that the administration had gone too far butting into people’s lives.

No matter what happens with Mayor Bloomberg’s law, it’s likely that apartment smoking bans will become more popular, further igniting the anger of the city’s nicotine-addicts.

kvelsey@observer.com

 

No Smoking! Majority of New Yorkers Like Smoke-Free Living