Going for distance

Alicia Robinson and Dave Brooks

Smokers may have to bring their tape measures when they visit state

beaches if legislators approve a bill that requires them to be within

20 feet of a trash can when puffing or face a $100 fine.

District Assemblyman Leland Yee (D-San Francisco) said he will

introduce the bill in the Senate natural resources committee today.

The assemblyman is not trying to stamp out smoking, he said, just the

litter it causes.

“We spend an extraordinary amount of resources to clean up our

beaches,” Yee said. “I am very respectful of those individuals who

want to smoke ... However, you’ve got to smoke responsibly.”

Several Southern California cities including San Clemente, Los

Angeles, Santa Monica and Malibu have passed city beach smoking bans

in recent months, and several others including Newport Beach and

Huntington Beach are considering bans.

Yee’s bill was initially an outright prohibition of smoking on

state-owned beaches. But he modified the bill Monday after he met

resistance from members of the Senate natural resources committee,

where the bill remained after some members abstained from voting on

it last week.

“All of a sudden, we were faced with Libertarian-type arguments

[such as] why should the state impose its will on people who are

doing something that is not illegal,” Yee said.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and the state parks department haven’t

taken a position on the bill. Parks officials are analyzing it to see

how it might affect their operations and what it might cost, said Roy

Stearns, state parks deputy director.

The state owns 64 beaches that comprise about 1/4of the state’s

coastline, Stearns said. And park users do periodically complain

about it.

The Huntington Beach City Council will consider passing a smoking

ban on city beaches and the pier on Tuesday. Councilwoman Connie

Boardman said residents, for the most part, support the ban.

“The idea was brought to us by a group of residents originally,”

she said. The city’s ban will regulate its’ 3 1/2 miles of beach,

stretching from Beach Boulevard to Seapoint Avenue.

Mayor Cathy Green said the goal of the ordinance was to protect

the health of the beachgoers, including herself, who are bothered by

secondhand smoke.

“I’m not telling them whether they can smoke or not, I’m telling

them they can’t smoke around me,” she said.

Like the state initiative, backers of the initiative hope it

decreases pollution on beaches.

Cigarette butts are considered litter, and littering already is

punishable by $100 fines -- if perpetrators are caught.

Park officials have done well with enforcing the limited ban on

alcoholic beverages, which are prohibited in some areas of state

parks and beaches, Stearns said, but bottles and cans are easier to

spot than cigarettes.

State beaches have trash receptacles about every 50 yards along

the sand and more in parking lots and camping areas, but smokers

don’t always use them, Stearns said.

“I don’t think that most [people] in the public think that a

cigarette butt is trash,” he said.

Boardman said cigarette butts do create a mess, but many of the

butts on the beach are washed there from storm drains and rivers that

drain to the beach.

“Having people smoke within 20 feet of a trash can I don’t think

is going to significantly impact the trash problem,” she said.

* ALICIA ROBINSON covers business, politics and the environment.

She may be reached at (949) 764-4330 or by e-mail at

[email protected].