Absolute ban on smoking a long shot for Kansas universities

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Jessica Bock, a research associate from Germany at the National Institute for Aviation Research, takes many of her smoking breaks at a designated smoking area near NIAR’s building, on the Wichita State University campus. If Bock worked at one of several universities across the nation that are enacting or discussing total bans on tobacco use, she might have to leave campus in order to smoke. California’s state system will ban all tobacco use in 2013.

A ban on use and advertising at the City University of New York system goes into effect in September, and the University of Missouri-Columbia is going smoke-free in 2014. Ohio higher education officials plan a vote this month urging all public campuses to ban tobacco use. The Kansas Board of Regents, which governs the state’s six public universities, introduced a policy in 2010 that bans tobacco sales and distribution on campuses.

But it has not banned smoking itself. “We have nothing on use,” said Vanessa Lamoreaux, assistant director of communications for the Board of Regents. “Decisions are left up to each individual campus.” WSU follows the Kansas Clean Indoor Air Act standards by offering employees a smoke-free workplace, said Ted Ayres, vice president and general counsel at the university. That means that smoking, including the use of electronic cigarettes, is prohibited in all campus buildings and also within 10 feet of any doorway, open window or air intake that leads into a building, facility or stadium. Other Kansas universities – both public and private – follow the same act, which basically regulates smoking inside and around buildings but not out in the open air, which is the object of a total smoking ban.

 “We are concerned for the safety of all our students,” said Michael Austin, provost and vice president for academic affairs at Newman University, a private university in Wichita. “We try to make sure that the students who smoke don’t affect the health of the students who don’t smoke, but right now we are not considering a tobacco ban on campus.” Friends University, another private Wichita college, restricts smoking to a few designated outdoor areas and has no plans to change the policy, said university spokeswoman Kate Bosserman.

 A total ban is not under discussion at the University of Kansas either, said Jill Jess, director of the KU News Service. According to the surgeon general’s report for 2012, tobacco use among people ages 18 to 25 remains at high proportions nationwide. About a quarter to a third of college students smoke, studies have found.