February 16, 2011
By Staff Reporter
One Irish American man attracted attention by angrily denouncing the ban and the mayor as the crowd prepared to enter City Hall.
“He’s not a king, he’s an elected official,” he said loudly as the television cameras moved in on him. His voice raised to a shout, he added, “I was in the army, I come from Irish people, they came here, they built this country, they built this city and paid taxes. Where’s the freedom? Smoking goes with drinking.”
Most of those attending the protest before testifying to the health committee were Irish bar owners and bar staff opposing the ban, but there were plenty of pro-ban protestors as well, perhaps outdoing the anti-ban group with their colorful signs.
With the debate over smoking in the city becoming more acrimonious, the hearing was the first time when everyone from the mayor to bartenders were able to air their opinions collectively.
Mayor Bloomberg has said that the issue is one of public health, and that in banning smoking in public places, he is protecting the health of bar staff.
Many bartenders have responded by saying that either they smoke themselves or do not care about the dangers of secondhand smoke.
And Irish bar owners have led the charge against the ban by saying that it will be bad for business, that smokers will stay away from bars. They are also concerned about public order issues if a crowd of patrons have to gather on the sidewalk outside a bar. Nor is it clear, many have noted, how the law would be enforced.
“Are we responsible for enforcing this?” asked Peter McCaughey, a Queens bar owner originally from Newbliss, Co. Monaghan, on the steps of City Hall. “Are we to be the police?”
Opponents of the ban said that the mayor merely revealed his ignorance of the issues when he testified first at the health committee hearing. Brian Rohan of the United Restaurant and Liquor Dealers of New York said that there was “laughter and disbelief when Bloomberg said that he thought bar owners would welcome the ban, because if people were not smoking, then they would drink more.”
“He said this with full conviction,” said Rohan, who attended the hearing, which lasted eight hours, until 8 p.m., “and he showed surprise at people’s reaction. He is out of touch with the realities of the bar business. Even supporters [of the ban] must have been laughing quietly at that.”
Ciaran Staunton of O’Neill’s bar on Third Avenue testified to the hearing and said later that “the mayor may be a successful businessman but he knows nothing about the hospitality industry.”
Staunton was particularly angered by the mayor’s suggestion while testifying to the committee that some of those opposed to the ban were secretly in the pay of tobacco companies.
“I said that I was there representing only my wife and children,” he said. Staunton has said in the past that a ban as stringent as the one proposed by Bloomberg will put him out of business.
Addressing the mayor’s suggestion that the ban would be good for business, Rohan said that if banning smoking was a business incentive, bar owners would have been doing it long ago.
Instead, he continued, New York bar owners had looked to the experience of fellow business owners in California, where the bar business, they say, was badly hurt by the 1995 ban on smoking there.
Anecdotal evidence from Irish bar owners in California has said that bar trade fell by as much as 20 percent.
In New York, bar staff at the meeting said they were concerned that the turnout to the meeting was lower than they had expected.
“I am not very impressed, I have to say,” said bartender Ronan McGrath, from Maggie Mae’s in Sunnyside, Queens. “A lot of people don’t believe it will come in this time, but I believe it will.”
His friend, Liam Hendrick, a Dubliner, works at Bloom’s bar, also in Sunnyside.
“I am disappointed in the turnout,” he said. “Word of mouth is not enough to get the people to come down here. As for the people who want to ban smoking, well, smoking and drinking go hand in hand.”
Staunton said that the next few weeks were crucial. “The mayor has said that he has 22 votes out of 51 in the city council secured,” he said, adding that at this stage there was still a possibility of a compromise bill. “He needs 26. Any bar owner who hasn’t picked up the phone yet to call and lobby against the ban must decide now whether he wants to see his business fall by as much as 20 percent. I believe this is a fight we can win.”