Mayor Bloomberg isn’t just blowing smoke!
The city’s stealth war on cigarettes is being waged in earnest, with five residential buildings — 513 apartments in total — being “educated” into banning smoking, The Post has learned.
An additional seven buildings containing 420 apartments are currently considering adopting smoke-free policies, according to the Partnership for a Healthier New York City, the nonprofit formed by the city Health Department to coordinate the federally funded smoke-free battle that’s part of a $300,000 health campaign.
“The goal of the work is to educate the general public so that people can make their own decisions,” insisted partnership director Earl Brown, whose group solicits community groups to do the grunt work.
To convince buildings to go smoke-free, the partnership’s contractors have conversations with tenants and building owners and managers to educate them about the harms of tobacco exposure — a process that can require “many meetings over a period of time,” Brown noted.
Buildings are “turned” by majority vote, and landlords have a legal right to ban smoking, and must only change the language of the lease — once its term expires — to do so.
When it’s time to renew the lease, smokers can decide to stay and quit, or leave, according to real- estate lawyer Adam Leitman Bailey, who added that landlords may not change the terms of rent-regulated tenants’ leases.
A total of 52 buildings have been approached so far, said Brown, who would not identify the properties.
“Once it is clear that there is a strong interest in voluntarily adopting a smoke-free policy, the building owner or manager will usually sign a document stating that intention,” he said, adding that the buildings may include co-ops, condos or rentals, which decide individually how to implement the policy.
There are no laws stopping a landlord from banning butts.The community groups are paid $10,000 apiece out of a Community Transformation Grant from the Centers for Disease Control, which besides smoking and junk food, also targets alcohol and exercise.
The work will stretch into next year, and already has the blessing of Democratic mayoral nominee Bill de Blasio.
“When it comes to public health, the mayor has been a real leader, and if elected, [Bill] de Blasio would build on his work to improve the health of all New Yorkers,” de Blasio spokesman Dan Levitan said.
Smokers-rights advocates were outraged by the campaign — which comes more than a year after Bloomberg and Health Commissioner Dr. Thomas Farley said there are no plans to institute cigarette bans in private residences.
“This is about educating the public about a discriminatory act, with the lie that it’s possible that someone smoking in their own apartment can cause harm to somebody in another apartment,” said Brooklynite Audrey Silk, founder of Citizens Lobbying Against Smoker Harassment.
“This is a crusade that we haven’t seen since Prohibition — it’s a hate campaign, not a health campaign.”