Suggested Smoking Ban in Federal Housing

Last week RentedSpaces told you about the hoopla surrounding a proposed outdoor smoking ban in West Hollywood. More recently the Apartment Guru looked at a smokers rights in a smoke-free building. Apparently all the anti-smoking sentiment and studies on how bad it is for you (not to mention those around you) is not enough to quell the issue.

Now the smoking-ban movement has come to federal housing. An article in The New England Journal of Medicine is stirring up the issue of smoking in public housing, with a call to the Department of Housing and Urban Development to ban smoking in all federally subsidized rental housing. If HUD imposed a smoking ban it would affect 7 million people.

The government telling people what to do never goes down easily in this freedom-loving country. But if scientists and doctors are urging such a widespread smoking ban, will the government listen? And should they?