Smoking ban leaves local businesses uncertain

Disc jockeying on the bottom floor of East End Oyster and Martini Bar didn’t have the best effect on Myles Bacon’s lungs.

Bacon, who coaches the Carolina Team Handball Club and works at East End part time, said the second-hand smoke inherent to the bar scene was hurting his athletics.

“You walk out at night and you just don’t feel great,” he said.

Although the statewide smoking ban has helped people like Bacon, whom the law intended to protect from secondhand smoke in bars and restaurants, business owners have faced the first weeks of the ban confused about its efficacy.

From Jan. 2 to the first week of February, 24 complaints were filed against a handful of Chapel Hill businesses, including East End, and business managers aren’t sure how to prevent more in the future.

Violations are registered based on anonymous complaints to the state’s health department. The county’s environmental health staff then gives a series of citations ending in $200 fines and possible court injunction.

Tom Konsler, Orange County’s environmental health director, spent the last month visiting businesses to follow up on first-time complaints by distributing educational material — the state-mandated response to a complaint.

“Most were pretty surprised that they were the target of a complaint,” said Konsler, who visited East End in January. “They felt that they were knowledgeable of the law requirements, and … really couldn’t give accounts of when these violations would have occurred.”

Bacon remembers taking Konsler’s visit as a learning opportunity, but still doesn’t understand the complaint’s origin. Before the ban, the bar prepared with “no smoking signs” and outdoor seating and a patio heater for smokers, a trend he’s seeing at other businesses.

Bacon said he was working during the infraction, but said the bar was so empty, he would have noticed if someone was smoking. Now he’s not convinced the anonymous complaint system has merit.

“If you’re willing to file a complaint, you have to be willing to talk on that,” he said. He worries the system could allow for angry customers to file false allegations out of spite.

Other downtown bars also were cited despite posting non-smoking signs and taking away ashtrays.

Down the street from East End, Players has received two complaints. Nick Stroud, Players co-owner, said he’s not sure his second-floor space which often reaches 300-person capacity can enforce the ban safely.

Stroud referenced the single customer exit — a staircase to Franklin Street that’s often crowded with customers waiting to be stamped in.

“We’re very anti-smoking,” said Drew Smith, Stroud’s business partner. “When there are 300 people inside, 100 leaving and 100 coming in, and someone’s smoking a cigarette, it’s a lot harder to control.”



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