Outdoor Smoking Ban

I applaud the City of Palm Desert for moving toward an outdoor smoking ban (April 29). But secondhand smoke from cigarettes is dwarfed by the volume of exhaust emitted by parked vehicles. Don't believe me? Try parking your car in the garage with your engine running for say 30 seconds. If you live to tell about it, compare that amount of pollution with thirty seconds worth of second hand cigarette smoke.

Palm Desert has several outdoor and curbside eateries. Inevitably, someone parks a running car just close enough so I'd prefer second hand smoke over car exhaust. I'm not sure why we are congenitally incapable of shutting off our engines; gas is nearly $4.00 a gallon, we say we don't want to depend on foreign oil and inevitable conflicts, and we all know air pollution hurts children and adults alike.


Wake up Palm Desert and the rest of California, the real ban should be on idling cars and SUVs.
[Note that this piece was published in the Desert Sun, May 4, 2008