Smokers say: Ban’s a Drag
Some welcome breath of fresh air in bars, taverns
Skibo Demon demonstrates his patented smoking harmonica schtick at the Brass Rail. After Jan. 1, Demon notes, if he does this while playing in a bar, he'll be breaking state law.
Shanda Tice / The Gresham Outlook
Skibo Demon can blow some serious harmonica. So you’d think he’d be looking forward to Jan. 1, when smoking is banned in Oregon bars, taverns, bowling alleys and bingo halls.
Think again.
“Sometimes I smoke and blow the smoke through my harmonica when I’m playing,” he says, just before he kicks into a rendition of Little Walter’s hit single “Juke.” For a moment, he looks like a mouth-organ munching dragon.
Demon is so dedicated to his smokes, he turned down a gig at an official party for the Super Bowl in Jacksonville, Fla., a few years back because his band couldn’t smoke on stage. To this bluesman, smoking is a matter of choice.
“You should have places that you can smoke and places that you can’t smoke.”
Lighten Up
During a visit to the Brass Rail Tavern in Troutdale, it was impossible to find a patron excited about the smoking ban.
“I think it’s going to hurt a lot of businesses,” Donnie Taylor says as he takes a puff. “It seems like alcohol and cigarettes for smokers go hand in hand.”
Taylor adds he’s a truck driver who travels the roads of California, Oregon and Washington. Truck stop parking lots have become gigantic ashtrays, he says, because no one can smoke inside.
His wife, Cindy Taylor, believes bars, not politicians, should decide whether to allow smoking.
“I believe it should be up to the bar owner because there’s a lot of places around town that are non-smoking,” she says.
She adds that she’s a polite smoker, even in a bar where she can light up. She asks her fellow patrons if they mind, and respects them if they do.
“I’ll move somewhere else or I just won’t light up,” she says.
Frank Sayler says the state government is attacking liberty.
“It’s supposed to be a free country, but these people are telling people how to run their business,” he says. “We’ve got too many laws as it is.”
Patrick Green, who doesn’t smoke, doesn’t mind if you do.
“It’s a stupid idea,” he says of the ban. “If people don’t like (smoke) they should go somewhere else.”
Raising a stink
At the M & M Lounge in Gresham, Thursday night is pool league night. Cue in hand, Melissa Kurth is puffing away on a cigarette but says she doesn’t mind the upcoming ban.
“I think it’s fine because I smell,” she says, echoing a point other folks make – a night in a smoky bar means a day at the laundry washing odor out of your clothes.
Kurth adds she’s a California native who’s used to smoking outside that state’s smoke-free taverns. However, her billiards buddy, Cathy Launce, is not happy about the ban.
“I think it should be up to the owner. I don’t think it should be up to the little people in Salem to make this decision for the owner.”
She also doesn’t understand the argument anti-smokers make about being forced to avoid smoky joints.
“If they know it’s a smoking establishment, they should choose not to come in,” she says.
Breathe free
At the Elbo Room in Gresham, it’s always been smoke-free. Indeed, the place smells more like a flower shop than a bar.
James Fahey is having a beer and says he prefers drinking in a tobacco free zone.
“In the past, it’s not been a choice. People light up next to you and say ‘I’m sorry.’ ”
He also likes the fact his clothes won’t smell of smoke when he leaves. However, he says he has mixed feelings about the smoking ban, and doesn’t think Oregon should have enacted it simply because other states did.
On the other hand, he rejects the argument that owners should have a choice whether to allow their drinking establishments to welcome smokers or tell them to butt out.
“It’s a regulated business,” he says. “The owner has already submitted to rules and regulations.”
If smokers don’t like the new law, he says, they should take it up with their legislators. Parks, stores, train stations – public places are ruled by laws, he notes, and no one is completely free to do as they please.
“Anyplace I go, there’s going to be something I don’t want to deal with.”
Smoking ban creates cloudy issue
In 27 years of toiling behind the bar, Jean Dilworth says the smell of cooking has always overpowered the scent of cigarettes at her Brass Rail Tavern.
“I smell like chicken when I go home,” she says.
A non-smoker herself, the warm, genial barkeep says she doesn’t mind her patrons lighting up when they stop in for a beer and friendly banter. That doesn’t mean she won’t do her best to enforce the statewide smoking ban when it goes into effect Jan. 1.
“If they want to light up,” she says, “I’ll tell them it’s against the law and they can’t do it in here.”
That doesn’t mean Dilworth is crazy about the new state-mandated restriction.
“I really feel I should have the option to say ‘yay’ or ‘nay,’ ” she says.
Although he says he wants to quit smoking, new Brass Rail bartender Chris Corn agrees with his boss.
“Smoking goes with drinking, and vice-versa,” he says. “There shouldn’t be a statewide mandate. It should be up to the owners.”
Heated issue
The Brass Rail, which has served as a venerable downtown Troutdale watering hole since the 1930s, is the quintessential “smoky bar” of countless story and song. The comfy establishment offers all the amenities one expects from the proverbial American “beer joint” – pool table, video poker machines, whimsical, off-color signs, and a line of giant jars containing pickled snacks.
About six years ago, Dilworth invested $900 apiece for two ceiling-mounted air purifiers. Given the number of patrons smoking on a Thursday afternoon, they seemed to be reasonably effective.
“I had Smoke Eaters before,” she says. “They do a good job.”
Dilworth admits she hasn’t been informed about technicalities of the new law, but she understands patrons will be allowed to smoke 10 feet from a bar entrance. She plans to put a portable propane heater at the far end of the beer garden out back to accommodate smoker holdouts.
She’s not sure how the ban might affect business.
“I’ve heard a lot of comments saying I’m gonna lose a lot of customers,” she says. “That might happen at first, but I think they’ll come back.”
Interstate traffic
Laura Warwick, a waitress and bartender at the M & M Lounge in downtown Gresham, expresses ambivalence about the upcoming ban.
“I’ll be glad to see it,” she says. “For me, there’ll be no excuse not to quit smoking. Customer-wise, I hate it, because there’s no need for people to come to our bar anymore.”
The M & M, Warwick says, has attracted smokers from Washington state since bar smoking was banned across the Columbia River.
“It’s gonna hurt them,” she says, adding that non-smokers “just accept” those who do – and gravitate toward the door. “I haven’t run into any staunch anti-smokers here.”
Bartender Danny Cranford was initially opposed to the ban, but came around the more he thought about it.
“There’s a good side in that it forces people to be good,” he says. “It will help make me cut back.”
Taking it outside
Down the street from the M & M’s meat-and-potatoes environs, the Elbo Room’s stylish basement lounge offers a sweet-smelling alternative. It’s been a smoke-free since it opened three years ago.
Bartender Kristen Sherry says she looks forward to the smoking ban. She’s convinced it will bring back those who left the nightlife behind in favor of fresh-smelling clothes.
“I know a lot of non-smokers who will enjoy it,” she says. “I’m hoping it will bring more people out — people who don’t want to come home smelling like smoke.”
Sherry sees nothing wrong with smokers stepping outside to indulge their habit. Plus, she says, it’s time for a change.
“If anything, they can go out for a smoke and come right back in,” she says. “Personally, I think this law is a long-time comin.’”
— Shannon O. Wells