Hundreds Show Up to Oppose Town’s Tobacco Ban

November 14, 2014
NACS Online
Public meeting in Westminster, Mass., ends early as crowd of 500-plus loudly voices opposition to board of health plan.
​WESTMINSTER — The public hearing on the Westminster, Massachusetts Board of Health proposal to prohibit the sale of tobacco products came to a sudden and early halt on Wednesday after some of the attendees — most of them opponents of the ban — repeatedly refused the chairwoman’s request to come to order.
The ban, proposed by the Board of Health in this Central Massachusetts town, would be the first of its kind. It has led to angry reactions from residents who worry that it will hurt the local economy and allow government too much discretion in controlling private conduct.
Emotions flared at the hearing, where about 500 people crowded into an elementary school gym. When one resident loudly pronounced himself “disgusted” that the board would make a proposal that infringed on personal choice, the crowd roared with approval, according to a report in the Boston Globe.
After several failed attempts to bring the hearing to order, chairwoman Andrea Crete gaveled the session to an end. As police shadowed Crete out of the building, many in the audience broke out in a verse of “God Bless America.” Opponents of the proposal also collected signatures on a petition to recall the three elected board members.
The ban would cover sales of products containing tobacco or nicotine, including cigarettes, chewing tobacco, and electronic cigarettes, which use batteries to heat nicotine-laced liquid, producing a vapor that is inhaled. Since the proposal was made public in late October, it has touched off an intense reaction from opponents. More than 1,000 of the town’s 7,400 residents have signed a petition against the ban.
While the public hearing will not be rescheduled, the town’s board of health will accept written comments on the proposed ban until Dec. 1 and the three-member elected board will then vote whether to enact the ban, probably at a meeting before the end of the year, according to Crete.