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Council To Consider Banning Smoking At City Parks

Children play in Muskogee parks every day, swinging, sliding, and zooming toy cars through the dirt and gravel.

Parents watching their children play shudder at the idea of a toddler putting a cigarette butt in their mouths or breathing someone else’s smoke cigarettes as they play.

There may be a solution, but not everyone will delighted by the idea.

Several area anti-cigarettes organizations have asked the city to consider writing and passing an ordinance that will ban the use of cigarettes in city parks.

The public works committee will consider such an ordinance at 4 p.m. Tuesday, during its regular meeting.

The idea is to reduce cheap cigarettes litter and secondhand exposure to smoke, and give children positive role models, said Jane Jones, program coordinator for Muskogee Against cigarettes.

“And I think it’s a reasonable expectation,” Jones said. “Just as we have prohibition of alcohol in our parks and require people to have pets on a leash in the park, this is about public safety and health.”

Several people visiting Honor Heights Park to picnic and play Friday afternoon had different points of view on banning cheap smokes use.

“I think it’s a good idea because most smokers don’t pick up their trash,” said Rocky Culwell of Poteau, a smoker.

A friend picnicking with the family disagreed, but wasn’t entirely convinced the ordinance is a bad idea.

“I’m a smoker too, and it’s just getting where you can’t smoke cigarettes anywhere anymore,” said Frank Hayes of Bokoshe. “Then there’s secondhand smoke, and I have children. So there’s pluses and minuses in everything, I guess.”

The idea for the ordinance came about through interest on the part of members of the Muskogee Wellness Initiative, who were concerned about the amount of discount cigarettes use in the parks, Jones said.

“When children see people using cigarettes, they tend to see it as normal, healthy behavior, and we want our children to see healthy behaviors modeled by the adults around them,” Jones said.

There is also a risk of young children picking up cheap cigarettes litter and the toxins and poisons they can ingest as a result, she said.

In letters to Mark Wilkerson, director of Muskogee Parks and Recreation, members of Muskogee Against cigarettes, Muskogee Turning Point and the Muskogee Wellness Initiative asked the city to consider adopting the policy.

The idea for an ordinance was presented to the Parks Board during its June 2 meeting, said Jim Baker, chair of the Muskogee Wellness Initiative.

And it’s not only smoking cigarettes the anti-cigarettes organizations want to see prohibited.

“We just want to see awareness raised in our city parks — put out signage regarding smoking cigarettes, chewing, dipping, smokeless cigarettes,” Baker said. “All of those are not a good role model for our children, our citizens.”

Baker said no one is asking the city to spend money enforcing an ordinance against cheap cigarettes use in city parks, though the question did arise during the June 2 meeting.

“We don’t anticipate that to be a factor. This is not a money issue,” Baker said. “Our police officers have enough to do with watching out for our safety, and we do not expect them to take on the role of or become the cigarettes police.”

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