Smoke alarm: Oklahoma tenants get few tobacco-free options

While some areas are enacting restrictions, that's not the case here
Read complete article: NewsOK, 2009-04-25
Author: VALLERY BROWN

Summary:
Laura Clay says she was being poisoned by a neighbor's cigarette smoke.

Clay, 31, of Norman, said she started complaining to her landlord about the smoke coming in the vents of her apartment a short time after moving there in 2007. When her 8-year-old daughter's asthma worsened and her son was born prematurely in summer 2008, Clay quit asking and started demanding that something be done.

"They told me there was nothing they could do," Clay said, "that my neighbors had every right to smoke in their apartment. But we couldn't breathe."

Then she started calling around for advice.

She reached Doug Matheny, tobacco use prevention chief for the state Health Department. He said secondhand smoke exposure in multi-unit housing like apartment complexes is an issue he regularly gets calls about.

Municipalities and counties across the country, including areas in Washington, California and Minnesota, have already banned or restricted smoking in multi-unit or public housing.

Matheny said Oklahoma isn't looking at policy options, but officials want to educate people about the health risks.

Percy Brown, project coordinator for the Tobacco Free Zone program, is working on a research project examining smoking trends in three of the Tulsa Housing Authority's 14 communities.

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