Council, School Board Meet to Discuss Outlawing Vaping Products

The Pasadena City Council will hold a joint meeting with the Pasadena Board of Education on Monday to discuss updating the city’s tobacco ordinance to ban vaping products.

The ban would “prohibit the sale and distribution within the city of mentholated cigarettes and/or other flavored tobacco products, including flavored products for electronic smoking devices (“ESD”), including ESD liquids, flavored little cigars, and tobacco look-alike products.”

Mayor Terry Tornek called the issue a “red alert.”

“Vaping is a scourge,” Tornek said. “It is an outrageous effort to addict another generation to nicotine. We have worked so hard in Pasadena. The public health department and others have worked so hard to reduce the impacts of smoking in our city. You know, we have a very aggressive smoking ordinance, controlling smoking locations and accessibility, and the vaping threatens to undo a good portion of that.”

As of January 14, 60 vaping-related deaths have been confirmed in 27 states and the District of Columbia. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have reported 2,668 hospitalized E-cigarette or vaping associated lung injury cases in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands.

According to a story in the Oct. 18 edition of the Pasadena Polytechnic School Paw Print, 53.7 percent of the respondents of a survey sent to students by the school paper said that they had witnessed another student vaping. However, very few of the 231 respondents said they vaped regularly. Of the 52 that said they had vaped, half of them had tried vaping once, 13 students reported they vape every few months and 11 said they vaped every few weeks. One student responded they vape once or more a week and one student said they vaped daily.

The Los Angeles Unified School District and Glendale Unified have announced lawsuits against a popular vaping company.

Although more than 50 communities in California and 250 throughout the nation have taken formal action to discourage children, teenagers, and young adults from smoking, no community in the San Gabriel are among the 56 listed as passing restrictions on the sale of flavored tobacco products.

“The emphasis of these actions has been on new and emerging flavored and menthol tobacco products. Proposed staff recommendations will limit access to specific tobacco products by children, teenagers, and young adults,” according to a City staff report accompanying Monday’s meeting agenda.

According to the California Department of Public Health (CDPH), the vast majority of teenagers say their first use of a tobacco product was flavored. Ninety-five percent of African-American teens 12-17 years of age who smoked cigarettes in the last 30 days smoked menthols.

Tonight’s meeting starts at 6:30 p.m. in City Council Chambers at the Pasadena City Hall, 100 N. Garfield Avenue.