Marlboro, Breeze Smoke, Juuls and many other nicotine products are getting into the hands of people under the legal age of 21.
To limit underage access to nicotine, the Athens City Council is considering an ordinance that will require smoke shops to get a license by Sept. 1, 2024, to sell tobacco products.
Councilmember Sarah Grace, D-At Large, reintroduced the tobacco retailer license, or TRL, ordinance, and the council gave the amended version a first read Monday, according to a previous Post report.
James Wanke, a relative of the owners of uptown convenience store Silver Serpent Exotic Gifts, spoke at the Monday council meeting to oppose the license ordinance. He said his family’s business has a perfect underage record for tobacco and alcohol purchases and the council should focus on underage drinking at uptown bars, which is a more “serious and relevant” issue.
City Law Director Lisa Eliason said the amendments were minor clarifications experts from Tobacco 21 and the American Heart Association suggested.
“They reviewed the ordinance,” Eliason said. “They made some changes (and) suggested some changes. Things like adding a definition. Then I presented it to Sarah, and she presented it to Council.”
TRL is a local government-driven policy that mandates smoke shops that sell any “nicotine delivery device or mechanism” have a license to sell those products, Ohio Regional Director of Tobacco 21 Wendy Hyde said.
There is no statewide license for vapor nicotine products, so without the TRL, smoke shops selling only vapor products can sell to whomever they want with little consequences, Hyde said.
“If you sell only vapor products, you don't need to have a license at all through the state, and so there's no way to enforce what's being sold or to whom that is being sold,” Hyde said. “(Being) licensed at the local level allows for an enforcement mechanism to be put in place.”
Hyde said the ordinance won’t affect businesses because it’s not prohibiting the sale of tobacco.
According to the ordinance, If a smoke shop is caught selling to someone underage, the first offense is a $350 administrative fee; the second offense within three years is a $500 fine and a seven-day TRL suspension; the third offense within three years is a $750 fine and a monthlong TRL suspension; the fourth offense within three years is a $1,000 fine, the TRL will be revoked and the license holder can’t sell tobacco products or apply for a license for three years. A fifth offense within three years results in another $1,000 fine and a permanent ban from obtaining a TRL.
“It defines the penalty structure involved if a retailer fails to comply with the law, and it's at no cost to the City of Athens,” Hyde said. “This is revenue neutral for the citizens and the taxpayers of Athens. The program is supported by the license fees that the retailers pay on an annual basis.”
Hyde said the TRL is not a new law, but it creates a local enforcement system that fixes the “loophole” between the state and smoke shops.
25 cities in Ohio have already passed a TRL Hyde said and the governments of at least three other cities are talking about adopting the policy.
The Athens Office of Code Enforcement and Community Development and the Athens City-County Health Department will have the authority under the ordinance to do unannounced compliance checks and give citations. However, the code enforcement office will license businesses.
“When they approached us, it just seemed like a good fit because we do enforce the smoke-free Ohio workplace state statute,” Administrator for the Health Department Jack Pepper said. “We have historically done a lot of tobacco and policy work out of the department.”
The department hasn’t figured out how exactly it will do enforcement or if there will be an underage component, Pepper said. The ordinance requires the department to do two unannounced compliance checks and a follow-up check three months after a retailer fails to comply.
“In the early stages, it would be quite frankly, just as simple as spinning the permitting process of making sure that everybody that needs a permit has one,” Pepper said. “Making sure that they're selling what they tell us that they're selling and that they're not selling anything that they shouldn't be.”
Pepper said the original ordinance was supposed to include a clause regarding banning flavored vapes. Flavored vapes tend to be marketed toward children, Pepper said, which means children are more likely to become lifelong users at a young age.
“We're certainly disappointed that this particular version of the ordinance doesn't include that,” Pepper said. “However, we're taking baby steps, and I think that the current version is a baby step toward that.”
Eliason said the ordinance will have a second reading at a special session Dec. 11, and the final reading will be Dec. 18. If passed and signed by Athens Mayor Steve Patterson, the ordinance will go into effect after 30 days.
