A study conducted one year after Grand Forks prohibited smoking tobacco in bars and other public places shows 84 per cent of respondents support the new legislation. “It’s grown to be one of the most agreement-building regulations,” declared Cordell Fontaine, director of the Social Science Research Institute at UND, which conducted the survey of 691 adults in November and December 2011.
The survey results show big support since the new ban was enforced in August 2010, he argued. “It’s essentially a repetition of the investigation we’d done in 2010.”
Majority of those investigated also declared that they believed that secondhand smoke is harmful for people’s health and smoking should not be permitted in workplaces. They also reported that they supported bars more now than they did before the city banned cigarettes smoking in bars.
The study was commissioned by the Grand Forks Tobacco Free Union, which pushed the city to prohibit smoking in all public areas in Grand Forks. The $29,000 cost was paid for by the state Center for Tobacco Prevention and Smoking Control Policy, which administers parts of the settlement the state made with Big Tobacco.