Action Center
Friday August 29, 2008
Smoking Ban Set for West Paterson Parks
WEST PATERSON – Lighting up in a park or on municipal property would draw a $200 fine under an ordinance being considered by the Borough Council.
“When parents take their toddlers to the park to climb the jungle gym or swing on the monkey bars, they don’t want people smoking around them,” Councilman Dominic DiDomenico said Friday.
DiDomenico, who is chairman of the council’s laws and ordinance committee, introduced the smoking ban at a council meeting on Wednesday. He said the committee began to work on drafting the ordinance after some parents complained last year about people smoking around their children.
Mayor Pat Lepore agreed that the ordinance is needed to protect children’s health.
“I don’t think that it is good to have that secondhand smoke around our kids,” Lepore said Friday, “even if it is in an open space.”
DiDomenico credits parent Sanjay Desaifor his vocal support of the smoking restrictions. Desai, 40, said he has seen friends and others battle lung cancer, and he worries his 8- and 12-year-old children could be sickened from playing near smokers.
“Why should they suffer?” Desai said.
Another parent agreed.
“In the long run, I think it’s best for the kids,” borough resident Rick Deprizio, 43, said at Frank D. Zaccaria Memorial Park Friday. “Kids don’t need to see people smoking.”
Several North Jersey municipalities, including Paterson, Clifton, Hawthorne and Little Falls, have their own smoking bans, supplementing the 2006 state law prohibiting smoking inside restaurants, bars and other public places.In Clifton, the area within 35 feet of City Hall’s front entrance is a smoke-free zone.
DiDomenico said there is wording in the ordinance that would allow the council to create smoking zones within some public places.
The council will vote on the ban on Sept. 3, following a public hearing at 7 p.m.
Reach Virgil Dickson at 973-569-7172 or dickson@northjersey.com.
Reprinted with permission. (c)2008 Herald News (Passaic Co., NJ) Virgil Dickson
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