Effectiveness of SUNY-Wide Smoking Ban in Dorms Is Still Unkown

By Daniel Lehrhaupt

Locked away on the second floor of the Health Services building at Stony Brook University is a white room lined with gray shelves containing close to 400 pounds worth of nicotine replacements, including gums and patches.

The Long Island Tobacco Action Coalition donated the products to the university in anticipation of the new State University of New York ban on smoking inside all residence halls. While many students have been complying with the new rules, which states students must smoke at least 20 feet away from residence halls, other students and staff have expressed doubts about the rule's effectiveness over the winter session.

"If it's snowing out and we have to be 20 feet away, how am I going to be able to light my cigarette with all the wind?" said Francesca Rachmanow, a senior who smokes. "Obviously, it's winter - who wants to go outside for seven minutes to stand there?"

Stony Brook residence staff expressed different concerns.

“The main problem with Greeley [one of the dormitory quads at Stony Brook that formerly permitted smoking inside] is there’s no marker - it’s hard even for me to see where 20 feet is,” said Matthew Gregory, the residence hall director of the Greeley residence halls in Kelly Quad. “The smokers have been good overall, but as it gets colder, people are going to have one foot through the door as they smoke so they don’t have to put on those extra layers to have their cigarette.”

Last year, the Suffolk County Department of Health joined forces with the Long Island Tobacco Action Coalition to help Stony Brook by providing the university with free nicotine replacements in anticipation of the ban, said Ellen Driscoll, a substance abuse counselor at the Stony Brook health center. “[Stony Brook Health Educator] Kathleen Valerio gathered all the products and now we have 400 pounds of nicotine replacements,” Driscoll said.

Even though a large majority of the gums and patches supplied by the Long Island Tobacco Action Coalition are sitting in a locked closet, Marianne Zacharia, a Tobacco Action Coalition member, said it’s understandable.

“Quitting is really difficult to do, and that’s especially true for young people,” Zacharia said. “They’re not at a point in their lives where they see the long terms effects.”

Valerio said about 175 Stony Brook students have received smoking cessation packages, and over the past two years about 67 students quit smoking.

Student reception of the ban has been mixed, with conflicting views within smoking groups and non-smoking groups.

Sophomore Rackeem Sheriff, a non-smoker, said he isn’t against the ban but doesn’t see how enforcement will work. “I personally wouldn’t mind not being under a cloud of smoke in front of the Staller Center,” he said. “The ban is pretty pointless - everyone’s going to smoke, they can ban whatever they want, but when it comes down to enforcing it, they’ll never be able to stamp it.”

Stony Brook Assistant Police Chief Douglas Little agreed that the ban is tricky to enforce. “In the position we’re in as law enforcers, we have to be diplomatic dictators,” said Little. “We have to understand this is an addiction, but smokers can not dictate their habit at the vast majority of people who might not like the smoke or want to endanger their health.”

Little has not, however, found smokers to be too much of problem as of now. “Even smokers who are addicted, they don’t break rules, they don’t want to break rules,” he said. “Yes, some want to smoke in their room, but our job is to educate them. They’re good people with an addiction.”

Baycan Fideli, a Campus Residences employee, said he hasn’t noticed the ban being problematic. “Everyone predicted doom and it hasn’t been doom,” Fideli said. “There were already a lot of people smoking outside before the ban. In our quads, we have smoking tables and they’re 20 feet away from the building, so that works out.” Fideli added that the issue with the ban isn’t that smokers have no rights; rather, activity has moved outside for smokers as a whole.

At SUNY Purchase, students either aren’t aware there’s a ban in place or are taking it lightly. “There’s a smoking ban?” asked Purchase junior Emilio Tirado, a non-smoker. “If it helps keeping fire alarms off at three in the morning, I’m pretty cool with that.”

“Our residents are actually supportive of the change. Even most smokers like living in a smoke-free apartment,” said John Delate, director of residence life at SUNY Purchase. “We do not send in [residence assistants] and [community assistants] to smell for smoke, but if someone is seen smoking or if the apartments smell smoky when we conduct health and safety inspections, we will follow through with a judicial hearing. To the best of my knowledge, I do not think we have had any hearings thus far.”

Joseph Vece, coordinator of community standards for residence life at Stony Brook, said the enforcement at the university has been similar. “All residence halls and apartments have announced monthly inspections conducted during which resident assistants look for any signs that smoking is taking place in the room in addition to other safety/health hazards and policy violations,” Vece said. “We are finding that students are respecting and appreciate the smoking ban in the residence halls.”

Vece said only two incidents have been reported. So far, Little said he hasn’t come across any problems with smoking inside dorms, but added that if Campus Residences had even three or four cases, it wouldn’t be a lot.

Jillian Lieberman, a SUNY Purchase junior, said she is aware of the ban but hasn’t witnessed it being enforced. As a smoker, Liberman said the ban won’t have a big impact on the smoking population. “If students want to smoke, they will find a way to do it.”