You might not be able to smoke ’em if you’ve got ’em — even if they’re e-cigarettes.
The city is planning to classify electronic smokes in the same restrictive category as regular cigarettes, which would make them off-limits everywhere from offices to restaurants to beaches.
“They may introduce a new generation to nicotine addiction, which could lead to their smoking combustion cigarettes,” Dr. Tom Farley, the city’s health commissioner, said in justifying the move.
A hearing before the City Council’s Health Committee is scheduled Wednesday, less than a month before the end of the Bloomberg administration.
E-cigarettes are battery-powered and allow users to inhale vaporized liquid nicotine without the smell of tobacco.
Defenders say they give tobacco addicts a chance to transition from more harmful tobacco smoke.
But council supporters, including outgoing Speaker Christine Quinn, say the city has to regulate e-cigarettes because their use has exploded among kids.
The electronic devices were being used by nearly twice as many middle- and high-school students in 2012 than in 2011, backers of the council legislation said.
They also argued it’s hard to distinguish between the real thing and the electronic substitutes for enforcement purposes.
But Andrew Rigie, executive director of the New York City Hospitality Alliance, said that as of a couple of months ago, most restaurants were not reporting e-cigarettes as a major issue.
The Bloomberg administration has been at war with the cigarette industry since taking office in 2002, and recently added landmark legislation that bans the sale of tobacco products to anyone under 21.
Quinn joined council member James Gennaro (D-Queens) and Health Committee chair Maria del Carmen Arroyo (D-Bronx) in proclaiming that the city’s crackdown on tobacco had lowered smoking rates and saved lives.
They warned jointly that e-cigarettes “threaten the progress we’ve made, and we must take decisive and immediate action.”
“Because e-cigarettes are designed to look like cigarettes, they pose a problem to business owners and threaten effective enforcement of the Smoke-Free Air Act,” they added.
The Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids said it strongly supports the legislation, arguing that allowing e-cigarette use in places where smoking isn’t permitted “could discourage smokers from quitting and lead them to dual use of both cigarettes and e-cigarettes.”