Results tagged “cigarettes”

First they came for the smokers in bars and restaurants, and we said nothing—we simply enjoyed breathing air without carcinogens. Now the Mayor is coming for the smokers on park benches and beach towels, and we're still saying nothing! As part of an ambitious new public health initiative, city health commissioner Dr. Thomas Farley announced that the Bloomberg administration would seek to ban smoking in all city parks and beaches. Public health advocates like Dr. David A. Kessler are elated; he tells City Room, "The issues with secondhand smoke are very real and the majority of the population today doesn’t want to be breathing in tobacco smoke, whether indoors or outdoors." Farley says the proposal to proscribe cigs may require the approval of the City Council, and health department spokeswoman Jessica Scaperotti tells Bloomberg News that officials haven’t yet devised "a specific strategy for reducing smoking in parks." But if cops can be as militant about busting smokers as they are ticketing people for public drinking, we're sure this'll be a big cash crop for the city.

Queens magician Richie Magic decided to skip past the vaguely creepy vibe that many in his profession put out and go all the way to full-on terrifying for a "trick" he pulled at his Elmhurst shop yesterday. Magic, who changed his name to pursue his dream after working as a corrections officer for 26 years, yesterday celebrated smoking his final cigarette by eating an entire carton in 6 minutes, 3.7 seconds, breaking a previous record. Magic, whose website claims his shows range from "mild to wild" said that his habit had nagged at him since "a lot of kids ask me to mentor them" and the News says he did not want to be "a hypocrite to aspiring magicians and street performers." Richie's wife Barbara (yes, also Magic) also butted out her final smoke yesterday, although she said she couldn't watch her husband's stunt. A 9-year-old girl who recently saw Richie Magic set the record for stuffing 20 lit cigarettes in his mouth in 29 seconds said, "It was cool. But disgusting."

If you thought you were getting your untaxed cigarettes from the Poospatuck tribal reservation this weekend, think again! A federal judge stopped the tribe's sale of untaxed cigarettes to those outside the tribe because NYC complained that people would of course buy untaxed cigarettes instead of taxed ones in the city and that the untaxed cigarette trade leads to bootlegging. The tribe has 30 days to appeal, and they vow to fight it. However, Mayor Bloomberg said, "The city will go after every dollar that is owed to city taxpayers." According to the NY Times, "City officials estimated that the sales deprived the city of $420 million from 2004 to 2008."

The city's health department just wants you to be healthy, which is why you can no longer innocently order a pina colada at Pizzeria Uno while pretending it doesn't contain multitudes of calories. The latest proposal to dispel New Yorkers' ignorant bliss involves requiring any retailers selling cigarettes to display graphic warning signs (like the sample here) about the dangers of smoking, plus information on where to seek help quitting. The proposed measure would require retailers to post the warnings wherever tobacco products are displayed, and also at the cash register or point of purchase. Officials hope it will help more New Yorkers quit; according to DOH stats, tobacco-related illness kills 7,400 people in the city each year. In fact, smoking kills more New Yorkers than AIDS, drugs, homicide and suicide combined! So today the Board of Health voted to solicit public comment on the proposed amendment (which you can read here), and a public hearing will be held on July 30th. What do you think? Too graphic or not graphic enough? (And last year the Health Department unveiled a line of graphic anti-smoking matchbooks.)

A State Supreme Court judge has blocked a state law that enforces the collection of taxes on cigarettes sold on Indian reservations. Earlier this month, Governor Paterson signed the bill to make sure reservations collect the $2.75 state excise tax, pointing out the law has always stood, it just hasn't been "adequately applied for far too long," not to mention it gave non-Indians "easy access" to tax-free cigarettes. The judge wants government officials to explain themselves next month, noting that the state hasn't even, the Buffalo News reports, "set up a process for providing rebates to Native Americans who pay taxes on cigarettes bought in reservation stores." Justice Margaret A. Murphy also thinks the state hasn't been respectful of the tribes, "You can’t point to [reservation] retailers and wholesalers, call them criminals, then expect them to come to the table."

Last month the city filed a federal lawsuit against eight of the biggest cigarette dealers on the 50-acre Poospatuck reservation in Mastic, Long Island, where 11.3 million cartons of untaxed cigarettes where sold last year alone. Mayor Bloomberg argues that the sales deprive the city of $195 million in annual tax revenue, and city lawyers are seeking an injunction to stop the defendants immediately, the Times reports. Harry Wallace, chief of the Poospatuck tribe, says, "It’s just interfering and trying to interfere with the lawful retail trade on our land." But the lawsuit alleges that many of the cigarette proprietors are not even members of the tribe, and that each of the 279 residents of the reservation (including children) would have to smoke 19,200 cigarettes a day to account for the millions of cigarettes sold there in 2007.

After consistently complaining about the state's failure to enforce tax laws on Indian reservation retailers who sell cigarettes to non-Indians, Mayor Bloomberg took action yesterday, filing a lawsuit in federal court in Brooklyn against eight smoke shops on the 50-acre Poospatuck reservation in Mastic, Long Island. The suit accuses the stores of selling cigarettes to bootleggers who smuggle the cartons off the reservation to sell them in the city, saving smokers a $4.25 per-pack tax.

Recovering drug addicts can look forward to climbing even further up the walls starting tomorrow, when all drug treatment centers in New York State implement a smoking ban. Bryan Lapsker, a 21-year-old PCP addict, tells amNY he’s been dreading the change: "Nicotine helps (addicts) get through the day. Now you take the nicotine away from us, it's almost impossible to get through the day. Addiction is addiction, I understand that, but nicotine is a legal substance." The state will now spend $8 million training health care workers how to treat nicotine dependence, and if the regulation’s a hit, maybe they’ll finally take away addicts’ caffeine, chocolate and soda pop, too.

An additional $1.25-a-pack tax on cigarettes goes into effect Tuesday, meaning that a carton of name brand smokes will cost a staggering $85. If the average cost of a box of premium brand cigarettes rises to $8.50, 50% of that cost is directly related to taxes ($2.75 to the State, $1.50 to the City).

The NY Times visited the corner of 61st Street and Amsterdam to find out what New York adolescent girls at the alterna-Beacon School think of "role model" Miley Cyrus. Recently the 15-year-old actress was caught flaunting her bare skin online and in print.

A member of the House Committee on Homeland Security will be releasing a report that alleges cigarettes sold on Indian reservations ultimately help fund Hamas and Hezbollah.

Considering that most smokers pick up the nasty habit during their impressionable adolescent years, it makes sense to put off exposing the tykes to the temptation until they're old enough to poison themselves. Riding that puff of thought, the State Health Commissioner Richard F. Daines wrote an open letter earlier this month to film makers this week asking them to refrain from including smoking scenes in G, PG, and PG-13 rated movies.