Pasadena May Ban Smoking : Health: Passions pro and con are building over the measure, which would apply to virtually all enclosed public spaces, including restaurants and workplaces.

Responding to a growing concern in Southern California about the effects of smoking on nonsmokers, the Pasadena City Council is preparing to consider a sweeping ordinance to ban smoking in virtually all enclosed public spaces, including workplaces and restaurants.

Passions for and against the measure, being drafted by the city’s Health Department, are already building.

“It’s not so much a health issue,” Mayor Jess Hughston, the main proponent of the law, said this week. “I have a right to breathe clean air.”

Other City Council members, who expect to consider the legislation in March, have expressed concern about the economic impact of a smoking ban on restaurants in the midst of a recession.

“I hate smoking with a passion,” said Councilman Chris Holden, “but a 100% ban puts an undue restriction on restaurants and small businesses when most of them are going under.”

At its meeting this week, the council voted to temporarily withhold a letter of support for a similar proposed restriction in Los Angeles after some council members objected that Pasadena restaurateurs had not been consulted.

“It would be extraordinarily hypocritical to write the letter unless we were doing the same thing (banning smoking) ourselves,” said Councilman William Thomson.

The Los Angeles City Council voted Tuesday to put off consideration of its own smoking ban for five weeks, while the city’s chief legislative analyst and chief administrative officer study the potential job losses and reduced sales resulting from a ban.

The proposed Los Angeles measure, authored by Councilman Marvin Braude, has met heavy opposition from the tobacco industry, restaurant workers and the 3,000-member California Restaurant Assn., whose representatives have said the ban would drive patrons to neighboring cities.

Restaurateurs in Pasadena expressed similar concerns about a 100% ban on smoking in their businesses. “People wouldn’t come to Pasadena,” said Nick Rasic, co-owner of Dodsworth Bar and Grill. “They’d go to Glendale, Eagle Rock, Arcadia. I’m not for it, I can tell you that.”

Rasic also expressed concern about the timing of the measure. “Right now, it’s tough, it’s tight; people are watching their dollars,” he said.

The California Restaurant Assn. said recently that the average profit for restaurants in the state is only about 3%.

Gregg Smith, who with his brother Bob owns the Parkway Grill and the Crocodile Cafe, said restaurants should regulate themselves.

“This is the United States of America, and that’s the way it should be handled,” Smith said. “There is far too much government intervention already. The businesses that listen to their customers are the businesses that are going to thrive.”

He said that in his restaurants, despite a current city requirement that only 25% of the seating be segregated for nonsmokers, the owners have designated between 80% and 90% of the seating for that purpose. “We regulate ourselves,” he said.

Smith said that a 100% city ban might hurt his business. “But a 100% ban in California wouldn’t hurt us,” he said. “Why not make it statewide?”

Vice Mayor Rick Cole agreed that a unilateral ban in Pasadena, without similar bans in neighboring cities, would be onerous for local restaurants. “Everybody does it or nobody does it,” he said.

He cited the example of Beverly Hills, whose City Council quickly reversed its 100% ban five years ago. Local restaurants reportedly lost up to 30% of their trade after the briefly imposed measure.

Hughston said he was seeking to communicate with other mayors in the county to encourage collective action against smoking. He is a member of the Pasadena Tobacco Control Assn., an alliance of citizens who support a smoking ban. The group seeks to serve as a liaison with other cities.