“We’re grateful for these resources but it’s still a quarter of what the CDC [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] recommends for tobacco prevention,” said Luci Longoria, health promotion manager for the Oregon Health Authority’s Public Health Division.
Oregon’s Tobacco Reduction Advisory Committee started combing through a draft $19.7 million 2015-2017 budget, one that looks similar to the $19.8 million 2013-2015 budget with a few changes.
For the first time, Oregon will use all of its $158 million biennial tobacco master settlement for healthcare-related expenses, and not divert the money to pay for other projects.
It seems absurd on the surface. When the state passed its Clean Indoor Air Act in 2007, it gave an exception to cigar bars and other smoke shops that focus on tobacco to continue to light up in their businesses, so long as they were certified to sell primarily tobacco products and built a closed ventilation system to protect other businesses from hazardous secondhand smoke.
This article is for premium subscribers. Please sign up here for a tax-deductible subscription.
If you're a premium subscriber, sign in below.
Sen. Mark Hass has killed the tobacco control bills this session, telling The Lund Report that a lack of compromise on all fronts and division among stakeholders, even among those who were natural allies, had left him with nowhere to go.
This article is for premium subscribers. Please sign up here for a tax-deductible subscription.
If you're a premium subscriber, sign in below.
The Senate voted overwhelmingly if belatedly Monday to ban e-cigarettes for minors and include them alongside most tobacco smoking in the Oregon Clean Indoor Air Act, but the passage of House Bill 2546 is unlikely to be the last word on tobacco control this session or the indoor air act.
This article is for premium subscribers. Please sign up here for a tax-deductible subscription.
If you're a premium subscriber, sign in below.
Senate President Peter Courtney, D-Salem, took in more money from tobacco companies in 2014 than any other Oregon politician, raking in $10,000 from Altria Client Services, the parent company of Philip Morris, which manufactures of Marlboro cigarettes.
America’s largest tobacco company made a big investment in Oregon legislators before the 2013 session and walked away with a legislative victory when a bill died on the Senate floor that would have sent unclaimed money from class-action lawsuits into an account for legal services for the poor.
OPINION – October 14, 2013 -- The state legislature’s special session is over, and the “Grand Bargain” has been struck. In terms of personal interest in the embattled package, I had more than a dog in this fight. I had an entire kennel.
OPINION -- September 4, 2013 -- Oregon holds the dubious distinction of ranking number one in the country for retailers illegally selling cigarettes to underage kids. Moreover, we have ranked number one three out of the past five years and ranked in the top five the other two years.
