Local lawmakers mull restaurant smoking ban

Publication Date: 2005-03-29

• Author:ERIN WALSH, The Island Packet
• Publication:Beaufort (SC) Gazette

If South Carolina and Georgia lawmakers have their way, smokers could be saying goodbye to that after-dinner cigarette in restaurants.

State Rep. Todd Rutherford, D-Richland, has introduced a bill that would prohibit smoking in restaurants statewide. Rutherford's bill was introduced the same day that the Georgia House approved a bill that would ban smoking inside most indoor buildings.

Georgia lawmakers added exemptions for bars, private rooms in restaurants and businesses with fewer than 10 employees. Georgia's smoking ban now must return to the Senate because of all the House's changes.