Deputy mayor Luke Charbonneau was concerned by the presentation as he felt Weppler was using a "sneaky" incremental approach in order to achieve the goal of making smoking illegal everywhere.Reading that coming from someone in any kind of power is almost surprising.
"What is the endgame of all this?" he asked. "You came to us a couple of years ago and you asked us to pass a bylaw to ban smoking in all of our playing fields. We didn't do that. We passed the resolution. Now you're back to us a couple years later and you're asking us to ban it on the beaches, and we've got this thing asking the county to ban it in entrances and exits to the municipally-owned areas and on private property.
"It seems apparent to me, given your logic in here, that next you'll be asking us to ban it on all municipally-owned property, followed thereafter by all private property. It seems to me that your goal is to ban smoking. And I'm confused as to why the Health Unit has decided to first come to the municpalities and ask us bit by bit, year over year to gradually increase the area whereby smoking is forbidden, when the obvious goal is to ban smoking. Why wouldn't you go to the province and ask them to ban smoking? It's a provincial election, I'm sure there'd be lots of guys out there willing to listen to you." "Charbonneau closed by saying he was uncomfortable with the notion of reducing people's rights.
"I think we should be looking at finding ways to enable people to do more things, and I don't think the public wants us to be nickel-and-diming them with more and more bylaw enforcement on their doorstep telling them what they should and shouldn't consume," he said.
Gives me a little ray of hope though when people think some things just go way too far.
The bad news and there is always bad news I think is that they or some of them at least think they could support some of it as a policy but not an actual law.
Wonder how that will work.
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