GALVESTON — Smoking advocates will find out today whether their lobbying against the smoking ban adopted by the city council earlier this year worked.
The council will consider drafting revisions to the smoking ordinance this week. The changes would be approved at a later meeting.
In July, the council adopted one of the strictest ordinances in the state, forbidding people from lighting up in bars, restaurants, outdoor seating areas, tobacco shops and private clubs.
The Galveston Restaurant Association supported the ban as proposed, which did not include tobacco shops and would have allowed smoking in outdoor seating areas.
But restaurant and bar owners balked at the more stringent restrictions.
On Oct. 22, association member Randall Pettit, who owns Club 21, asked the council to modify the ordinance to mirror the original or extinguish it.
“We’re asking for the original ordinance,” he said. “Your constituents are speaking. We just have to figure out who’s listening.”
Although both smoking ban fans and detractors have criticized the new ordinance, which takes effect Jan. 1, few can agree on how it should be changed.
Bar owners who do not have room for an outdoor patio stand to suffer the most if the ordinance is not changed. They are likely to lose customers to bars where patrons can at least smoke outside.
In adopting the ordinance, council members said they wanted the ban to be as fair as possible. Councilman Tarris Woods, whose vote at the time was needed to ensure the ordinance passed, said he would agree only to a total ban, with no exceptions.
He said later he would vote to rescind the ordinance if anyone tried to modify it.
Woods, who did not return calls seeking comment for this story, and Mayor pro tem Danny Weber, who opposes the ban, asked for the discussion to be placed on today’s agenda.
