By Yesenia Valle
Although California State University Chancellor Timothy P. White and the Academic Senate proposed a CSU-wide smoking ban last year, Fresno State has yet to participate in the proposal.
Initially, the chancellor proposed that all schools in the CSU system should become nonsmoking schools by the end of 2013. The proposal then became a campus-by-campus decision. CSU Fullerton and CSU San Diego are the only campuses to participate so far.
Lisa Kao, an administrator in the office of environmental health and safety, risk management and sustainability department, said that Fresno State has yet to make any plans to ban smoking completely from campus.
“At this point, we are just waiting to see if the chancellor wants it to happen,” Kao said. “He has to make it mandatory, and that has yet to happen.”
Kao said that in order for a smoking ban to take place, a list of people would have to be consulted.
“We are not to where anything is being planned yet. Nothing is set in concrete,” she said.
Georgianna Negron-Long, health educator at the Student Health Center, said she can understand why a smoking ban was proposed, and in the future she foresees more universities adopting the ban, including Fresno State, however, at this point, she says it is nowhere close to happening.
“A university campus is not like a restaurant where you can declare it to be smoke-free and have the ability to change it and enforce it,” Negron-Long said. “This ban is in very new stages. At this point, it’s just an initiative and not a mandate that came from the chancellor’s office.”
There are many things to consider when it comes to the ban, she said. The students who do smoke also need to be considered. Smokers should be supported and pointed toward resources and help in order for them to quit smoking, should they choose to do so.
“There isn’t a large smoking population on campus, but we do not want to alienate them,” she said. “We have a responsibility to serve all students.
“It all comes down to everyone’s own choice. The students who do smoke are not mentioned in the ban, and they should also be taken into consideration.”
Even if the ban was to be put in place, she realizes there will be students who choose to break the rules, which brings up how students would be punished if caught smoking on campus and what will be done to enforce the ban.
“According to the CSU Senate, we will have to create a task force for the enforcement of the ban,” Kao said.
Neil O’Brien, ASI senator of Health and Human Services, says the ban isn’t necessary and that the smoking policy now in place is sufficient.
“There are other remedies out there. This ban wouldn’t be one of them,” O’Brien said. “We have smoking areas. That is good enough. We just need better promotion of them.
“We need to let people know where they are so they can use them or so they can avoid them.”
He also says that instead of forcing students not to smoke, the school should promote an awareness campaign so people can choose to stop smoking.
“It’s a personal choice. It’s free will,” he said.
O’Brien fears the punishment for students caught smoking on campus if the ban is placed.
“Will these students be put on disciplinary or academic probation? I wouldn’t want something so silly to impact a student’s record,” he said. “I understand the intention of the ban, but it is not the right choice.”
The only changes Fresno State might see in the smoking policy anytime soon might be the inclusion of e-cigarettes, which are currently not in the policy.
“I have asked Dr. [Joseph] Castro to convene a smoking review committee to include e-cigarettes in the school’s smoking policy,” Kao said. “But other than that, there is nothing to report so far.
