Council Approves Tobacco-Free Ordinance

The Montville Town Council voted unanimously to adopt a resolution that will keep recreation areas in town tobacco-free.

Stanley J. Gwudz and  Eileen Cicchese, chairman and vice chairman respectively of the Parks & Recreation Commission, and Patrick McCormack, director of health of the Uncas Health District, spoke during a public hearing preceding the main council hearing. They all urged the council to vote to accept the ordinance.

Anyone violating the ordinance will be subject to a $99 fine for each separate offense or violation.

 “It’s most important that our youth get the message that we care about what happens in our parks,” said Cicchese.

The idea for the ordinance came up a year and a half ago, she said, when she was at a football game and saw a large number of people smoking.

“We were quite taken aback by that, or at least I was,” Cicchese said. She and Gwudz said they think Montville might be the first town in Connecticut with an ordinance on smoking in recreational facilities.

After the public hearing, Gwudz said that the Parks & Rec Commission had thought about asking that the ordinance be adopted townwide, but got some pushback from people in different areas, including from seniors.

Gwudz and Cicchese said they expect citizens and users of the town’s recreational facilities to enforce the ordinance. It will be incorporated into the paperwork that governs the use of the facilities by various teams and organizations, as well.

“Everyone’s going in that direction,” Gwudz said.

He and Cicchese said that once the ordinance becomes the norm, people will comply with it; regulation will not be an issue. People will use the fact of the ordinance to enforce it.

It will apply to all recreational facilities in town, including the playing areas, fields and pavilion area at .

As for expanding the ordinance, Gwudz said, “We’ll leave it up to the council” to decide whether to implement it townwide.

At the very end of the council meeting, during the public comment session, one citizen got up to speak his mind on the ordinance.

Ken Evans, who said he is not a smoker, said he disagrees with the ordinance.

“I think it’s political correctness run amok,” he said, and added that he thought an intermediate step, such as designating places where people could smoke in the town’s recreational facilities, would be the thing to do. He said that other activities that create smoke – like burning wood in fireplaces and woodstoves, and barbecuing -  are not prohibited.

“I think this is what’s wrong with the country,” Evans said.