UTD to enact tobacco ban

University officials will implement a new ban on Aug. 31 targeted at further eliminating tobacco on campus, according to a university webpage that was under development as of Aug. 23 and email from the university. The ban will be discussed in a town hall meeting that has been scheduled for 11 a.m. Aug. 28 in the Engineering and Computer Science South Building.

Although the details are not yet finalized, the ban is the result of a requirement the Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas, or CPRIT, adopted in February. This requirement states that all recipients of CPRIT funding in amounts greater than $25,000 must be tobacco-free, and UTD is one such institution that is awarded CPRIT grants.

According to the webpage, the ban would include all forms of tobacco products, including smokeless varieties such as snuff and electronic cigarettes. Also known as e-cigarettes, the smokeless device lacks the health problems of a traditional cigarette and helps many smokers quit. The plan mentioned in the webpage will primarily affect the Berkner and the Natural Science and Engineering Research Laboratory, or NSERL, buildings, as they receive the CPRIT funding.

Although smoking is already prohibited in all buildings and within 25 feet of airways, the new policy would expand that to ban all tobacco products in the area and buildings immediately adjacent to NSERL and Berkner, as well as prohibit tobacco within 10 meters of campus buildings and other tobacco-free zones. In spite of the large population of smokers on campus, some people are excited about a tobacco-free policy and the prospect of healthier air.

“I have asthma. I hate walking around and having people smoke,” said biology junior Michelle Bui. “People don’t listen to the signs that say to smoke 20 feet away from the door. They just sit there and smoke and you smell it all throughout the air.” Despite the prohibition of e-cigarettes, there are still options for those who would want to quit smoking and other tobacco-related activities. The UT System’s Living Well program offers free tobacco cessation assistance, including counseling and various nicotine replacement drugs, to UT System employees. Students will be able to receive online assistance through the Student Wellness Center.

“We are going to try and have programs that will try to convince students to not use tobacco. It’s not healthy for you,” said Student Government President Rajiv Dwivedi. “The awareness has to come gradually, though. You can’t force it on someone.” Students, faculty and staff who consistently violate the policy may be subject to the standard disciplinary actions outlined in their respective conduct policy, though the university strongly encourages peers to remind offenders of the policy and encourage them to refrain. Until recently, the webpage had stated that all tobacco products were to be completely banned from the campus, including all outdoor areas, by the fall 2013 semester. It is unclear if this proposition will make it into the final draft of the new policy.

As the restrictions the webpage outlines on smoking do not differ greatly from the existing rules on smoking, there is a possibility that smokers on campus could ignore the new policy all together. “Banning something on what is essentially open air doesn’t make a lot of sense to me,” said Adam Burns, historical and literary studies sophomore. “You are going to have really irritable smokers. It is just going to result in the university trying to enforce something that is disobeyed so often that it cannot possibly be enforced.”

While there could be various improvements in the overall health and aura of campus resulting from the cleaner air, some believe it would promote more headaches than healthy lifestyles. “The evidence for secondhand smoke damage is kind of thin, but it makes sense; I’m not going to discredit it,” Burns said. “But you can’t even begin to argue a secondhand risk for chewing tobacco or electronic cigarettes. It’s water vapor; it’d be like banning humidity.” More information on the university’s tobacco-free policy will be posted on the UTD website.