LOS ANGELES : Wachs Seeks Enforcement of Anti-Smoking Law
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Saying the Los Angeles city attorney cannot pick and choose which laws he will enforce, Councilman Joel Wachs on Tuesday called for immediate resumption of enforcement of the city’s anti-smoking ordinance.
The request came one day after The Times reported that budget cuts had led City Atty. James K. Hahn to quietly cease enforcement of the ban on smoking in elevators, supermarkets and portions of workplaces and restaurants. In his motion introduced Tuesday, Wachs also called on Hahn to report on whether enforcement of other laws has lapsed.
Hahn responded that the smoking ordinance is the only law his office has stopped enforcing to cut costs. “If they want me to renew enforcement of this law, they (the City Council) will have to put their money where their mouth is.”
The agency’s two-member smoking enforcement team was phased out in 1989, and the office stopped taking any smoking complaints in January.
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