Details of smoking ban vague

Publication Date: 2005-07-24

• Author:DALE WETZEL
• Publication:Bismarck (ND) Tribune

A week before North Dakota's new anti-smoking law takes effect, business people are asking how they can avoid fines for trying to accommodate employees and customers who light up -- and they're not getting answers...

If you're a business owner, how do you handle it when someone walks in and illegally fires up a smoke? The law says the smoker may be fined as much as $500, but the business also may be fined at least $100, if its proprietor willfully allowed the violation.

"To me, we need something that tells the business community that, 'Look, if somebody lights up a cigarette, you ask them to put it out, and at that point in time, you are no longer liable,'" said Dave MacIver, president of the Greater North Dakota Chamber of Commerce...

"We really don't tell them anything," said Richard Riha, the Burleigh County state's attorney. "We can't give a private business legal advice. ... We aren't being very helpful to the businesses, because we really can't be."

Birch Burdick, the Cass County state's attorney, says it is difficult for a county prosecutor to answer questions about how the law may apply to a specific business...

Last week, North Dakota's Health Department began circulating a brochure listing answers to some of the most common questions local and state officials have heard.