Smoking soon to be banned on all Seminole school property

Smoking will be outlawed on all Seminole school district property, both inside and out, under a tough new anti-smoking policy the School Board plans to adopt.

Seminole school district employees won't be allowed to step outside to smoke, and fans at football games will be prohibited from lighting up, as well.
Better health for smokers and bystanders is the goal of the new policy, which would take effect July 1, officials say.

"It certainly is beneficial to the employees not to smoke," Deputy Superintendent George Kosmac said. "But people complained about second hand smoke, and that is the real motivator."

While smoking inside Seminole school district buildings and vehicles has been prohibited for years, employees and other adults were permitted to smoke outside in designated areas. But the state Legislature changed the law last year to let school districts ban smoking outside, too, School Board Attorney Ned Julian said.

Despite confusion over a school board's legal authority, Lake initiated a full ban in 2000 at the insistence of School Board member Kyleen Fischer.

And the Orange County School Board recently updated its smoking policy to a full ban as well, although spokeswoman Shari Bobinski said it largely had been in effect for years. A main effort of the recent revisions was to prohibit smoking outside the school district office in downtown Orlando, she said.

Although there is no exact count, in Seminole the number of school district employees who smoke has fallen in recent years, Deputy Superintendent Kosmac indicated. He estimated there might be only 10 smokers among the more than 250 employees in the school district headquarters on Lake Mary Boulevard in Sanford. Other smokers are scattered in schools and other school system work locations throughout the county.

David Apfelbaum, director of risk management for Seminole schools, said smokers will be encouraged to sign up for smoking cessation programs available through the district. They will have access to chewing gum, nicotine patches and low-cost prescription drugs to help them overcome the habit.

Tony Gentile, director of the school system's employee unions, said he personally does not favor smoking. But he expects objections to the new policy, which will come up for School Board approval later this winter.