Take action now for a Smokefree Alaska!

Publication Date: 2016-02-26

Help support a Smokefree Alaska:
Speak up for Senate Bill 1 and House Bill 328

Great News! On Monday, House Bill 328 was introduced in the Alaska Legislature as a companion to Senate Bill 1. Both bills are opportunities to adopt a statewide smokefree air law for Alaska!

We need your help:

Send a Letter to the Editor of your local news outlet today!  Lawmakers read these letters and take the message to heart as an indicator of their constituents’ support for a smokefree Alaska.  To submit a letter to one of the larger newspapers, click on the name:  Alaska Dispatch News, Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, and Juneau Empire.

Be sure that your letter asks for your lawmakers to vote in favor of Senate Bill 1 and House Bill 328 for a Smokefree Alaska.  Keep your message positive and up-beat.  Remember, every worker in Alaska deserves a smokefree workplace.  Alaska can make this happen by passing Senate Bill 1 and House Bill 328. 

Other things you can do: As you read your local newspaper online, or other online publications like blogs and social media, speak up and post comments in support of Alaska taking action to protect everyone’s right to breathe smokefree air on the job by adopting Senate Bill 1 and House Bill 328.  You can make a difference by spreading the word!

Sample talking points for a Letter to the Editor:

• Passing Senate Bill 1 and House Bill 328 will save lives and save money for the great state of Alaska.  
• Everyone deserves to breathe smokefree air on the job. Now is the time for Alaska’s lawmakers to act!
  
• Senate Bill 1 and House Bill 328 seek to safeguard Alaskans from the health hazards of secondhand smoke exposure by ensuring that all workplaces and public places are smokefree.
  
• These bills will extend smokefree air protections to Alaska’s unorganized boroughs and second-class boroughs that do not have the ability to adopt their own smokefree laws.
  
• Adopting these bills can reduce the $67 million Alaska spends each year on Medicaid expenditures attributed to smoking.
  
• E-cigarettes and other electronic smoking devices should remain in Senate Bill 1 and House Bill 328.  There is simply no need to use these products inside shared air spaces, like workplaces and public places, where others must breathe in the hazardous secondhand emissions.  Just like traditional cigarettes, e-cigarettes should be used outdoors and in ways that don’t impact the health of others.
  

Thank you for your support of smokefree air!

See the full alert at http://salsa4.salsalabs.com/o/51299/t/0/blastContent.jsp?email_blast_KEY=1299740