Tobacco Sales in Lane County - Spring 2017

Lane County Commissioner Pat Farr has a close first-hand experience with the negative effects of tobacco smoke. His father had been a long time sufferer of emphysema before passing away, and his mother passed away after a battle with lung cancer.

As a witness to the journey his parents took, from smoking, to being diagnosed, to the end, Farr knows that the best way to combat the ill effects of tobacco smoke is to get people to never start smoking in the first place.

Easier said than done, as one would imagine; However, Farr has been an integral part of Lane County’s movement to accelerate national trends in the decline of tobacco smokers. Despite his personal experiences, Farr says the importance of creating such changes extends beyond his own lifetime and backstory. “That's not the single reason I am working on this. Everybody has that same story. My story isn’t for my mom, it’s for my grandson, who I think should never start smoking.”

As of June 13 Lane County’s new tobacco law, which requires individuals to be at least 21 years of age to buy tobacco products and paraphernalia, will have reached the two month mark since its enactment.

The ordinance (17-01) has made Lane County a pioneer in Oregon, being the first county in the state to push the tobacco-purchasing age requirement from 18 to 21, and has sparked a movement among state politicians in Salem to pass a similar, state-wide law that is currently waiting on a House vote after being passed by the Oregon Senate.

Current rates for smoking among middle and high school students have been steadily decreasing over the past decade or more, but with the rise in tobacco alternatives (vaping) that are sometimes falsely advertised as a relatively safe alternative more and more students have begun to try these tobacco alternatives. This is partially due to the fact that at this point tobacco alternatives appear to be less stigmatized and singled-out by anti-smoking campaigns in comparison to cigarettes.

Between 2011 and 2015 the percentage of high school students who said they had used electronic cigarettes jumped a rather shocking amount, from 1.5 percent to 16 percent. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention states that if current adolescent smoking rates continue, then 1 in every 13 Americans aged 17 years or younger will die early.

One aspect of the new law that Lane County residents may not realize is that the passing of the ordinance was a bipartisan motion. Such bipartisan support is crucial when creating widespread changes which contradict years worth of ‘the norm,’ which in this particular case is legally being able to buy tobacco at 18. “This law would not have passed without two republican votes,” recalls Lane County Commissioner and democrat Pete Sorenson. Although county commissioners are typically nonpartisan in that they do not run with an agenda aligned heavily on either major political party, their votes many times reflect their own registered party affiliation.

That being said, Sorenson says he has heard “virtually no feedback” from the community or constituents since the law has been passed. This lack of feedback could possibly attest to a general population consensus as to the awareness of the effects of smoking tobacco.

The health issues associated with the smoking of tobacco have been well researched and documented over the past few decades, which has made the passing of such laws that much easier as there is relatively no debate as to the health consequences of tobacco; However, Sorenson did mention that before the law went into effect, he received a handful of emails and phone calls ‘warning him’ of the negative community pushback and world of pain he was about to bring upon himself by enacting such a law. Since then, he has not received any complaints or any motions to change the law.

Sorenson says that complaining about a particular issue is easy with online outlets, but to actively create a movement to alter or change a current law takes real effort and manpower, instead of creating a blog post or online petition.

One of these cautionary phone calls could have possibly been describing one Rich Johnson, owner of the popular glass and smoking accessory shop Midtown Direct. Johnson was quick to state his disdain for the new law, and when asked if the change had hurt his business, he claimed that since the law went into effect on April 13, he has seen an immediate loss of 20 percent in sales.

These losses have not only been strictly financial or personal, either. Johnson says that he has had to lay-off some younger and more inexperienced employees, which he explains is unfortunate because he can no longer teach new workers how to run a ‘mom and pop store.’

He also said that because a large portion of his glass inventory is made regionally, the losses in sales extend to those glassblowing businesses as well and could hurt an entire industry. Since Johnson is allowed to sell his incense and incense accessories to those between 18 and 21, he has learned through customer testimonials that young adults are simply buying glassware online instead from cheaper, and many times foreign sources.

According to Lane County’ health statistics, between eighty to ninety percent of long term smokers begin smoking during adolescence. Now while public perception may suggest that smoking rates are down and therefore the problem is being taken care of properly, in reality social modeling still plays one of the most important roles in getting youth to start smoking, and this aspect will be much more difficult to combat. If an individual knows older people who can give him or her access to cigarettes, then the law doesn’t seem to be entirely effective.

“They (proponents of the new law) think that this will stop 18 year olds from smoking, but by that point it won’t change anything because they have already made the decision to smoke,” says Johnson.

He claims that many of his customers who are now not allowed to buy tobacco from his store now simply travel outside the county boundary to convenience stores, or in more cost-effective cases find wholesale tobacco vendors to stock up.

Johnson has also heard stories from young adults who have purchased tobacco products from locals over 21 on selling services such as craigslist or apps like letgo. These people who sell to those under 21 also do so for a small profit, which according to Johnson is creating an incentive for a black market. He is confident that if the new law was somehow appealed and taken to court, that it would be repealed, although he has not taken any action to initiate such a process.

If there are more individuals with viewpoints similar to Johnson’s, then the lack of social activism in regard to repealing the new law may reveal a new, general societal understanding of the harmful effects of tobacco. It is one thing for an adult to light up a cigarette for his or her self, but it is a completely more complex and potentially morally debatable situation to give a substance that is understood as harmful to a youth.

Johnson’s statements somewhat echo what University of Oregon students have voiced on the topic.

“When I was 17, I almost always found older people to buy me cigarettes and rolling papers, so I’d imagine it would be the same thing for people under 21 now,” says 23 year old senior Will Fettig. Fettig also explained that in his own experience, people who smoke tobacco hang out with other people who smoke. “I don’t really normally see a lot of people just outside who aren’t smoking around people who are. Maybe one or two people.”

These social molds and bonds may be the most difficult aspect of young people smoking to combat for those working towards a tobacco-free future, or at least a future where tobacco related illnesses are minimal. Smoking not only functions as an avenue for personal relief through the drug nicotine, but also serves as an activity that takes place in a social setting where young adults are likely to be, such as a party or concert. If smoking is associated with large social settings in the minds of young adults, individuals are less likely to consciously make the independent decision to not smoke because of their surrounding environment.

In an area such as Eugene, where there is a high population of young adults under the age of 21 interacting with those 21 or older, the effectiveness of the new law may be largely unseen. It has been a long standing ‘tradition’ among college campuses for younger students to ask the older ones to buy alcohol for them. Given that almost all liquor stores also sell tobacco products, the prospect of adding cigarettes when asking an older student to purchase alcohol appears simple, and there is evidence to suggest that nothing substantial will change. A scholarly article published by the American Academy of Pediatrics in 2002 reviewed data from nine separate studies as to the relationship between access prevention programs or policies and youth smoking rates. According to the article, there was almost no difference (decrease of 1.5 percent) found between communities that had policies which prevented youth from legally buying tobacco, and ‘control’ communities, which were essentially communities enforcing the normal minimum age of 18.

It could also be that the decrease of young adult smokers won’t be seen for a few years, as younger adolescents grow up and become young adults in a setting where being at least 21 years of age when purchasing tobacco is the standard. Other factors that extend beyond legality and social situations like locally and nationally distributed media either depicting smoking or trying to get people to quit, as well as cigarette prices, may prove to be crucial factors which could affect a young person’s decision to start smoking.

Farr, who obviously voted for the passing of the ordinance, is quick to admit that while the change is a step in the right direction, the challenges of preventing smoking-related illnesses goes beyond moving the minimum age up to 21. “Laws can’t fully change people’s behaviors,” he said. To add context of the difficulty of enforcing such changes, he gave a hypothetical situation where a police officer has more important things to do than to look out for 18 year-olds smoking; However, Farr says that as a minimum, if the new law can get younger people to start thinking about the consequences of smoking tobacco and prevent a teenager from smoking, then it is successful to some degree.

The goal of outlawing the smoking of tobacco entirely is a far-fetched one, but steps in the right direction are happening, and as Farr puts it, “well that’s what it’s all about, getting fewer people to start smoking,” citing previous successes towards a tobacco-free environment such as changes outlawing smoking indoors, in planes, and in many public places. Oregon currently ranks 9th out of all states in terms of workplace exposure to secondhand smoke.

From Johnson’s perspective, the new law will have little effect on the amount of youth tobacco smokers, and quite possibly could lead to an increase in young smokers. “Young people do not like to be told what to do, and so they (the commissioners) are making it cool again because now youth are rebelling against the law.” Whether or not this particular view is entirely factual in reality, there is something to be said about the discrepancies between rights given to 18 year olds versus 21 year olds. U.S. citizens can vote, be drafted by the military, and be tried in court as an adult at 18.

These views being said, there are researched and highly quantifiable adverse effects from tobacco use as well as large amounts of alcohol. CDC statistics state that between 2000 and 2004, over 5,000 people died as a result of tobacco use in Oregon alone, which was proportionately ranked 26th out of all states. Not the worst by any means, but definitely not great.

So it could be that the debate lies more in deciding how much power the government should have in regard to allowing adult citizens the freedom to choose which traditional recreational substances we ingest given that health information is so readily available in the modern age. Do we as American need or want our government to set policies which take away some purchasing freedom for voting, tax-paying adults, even if those policies are in their best interest?