Lawmakers to vote on banning smoking on N.J. beaches

The ban exempts golf courses and lets towns decide whether they want to carve out a smoking section on beaches

BELMAR -- State lawmakers will take another shot at banning smoking on New Jersey beaches and other public areas when the state Senate on Thursday takes up a revised version of a bill vetoed by Gov. Chris Christie.

Using the upcoming Memorial Day weekend as his backdrop for the announcement, state Senate President Stephen Sweeney (D-Gloucester) was in Belmar on Tuesday to drum up support for the bill (S1734) that would ban smoking on all beaches, state parks and forests.

"We think this is an appropriate time to remind him (Christie) we think this is important," Sweeney said. "It's about quality of life. If you look at beaches where they do have smoking, they actually treat it like a giant ashtray and it's unfortunate. It's an environmental hazard. It's a health hazard."

N.J. lawmakers to smokers: Get off the beach

Sweeney said tourism would improve by having cleaner beaches.

Cindy Zipf, executive director of Clean Ocean Action, said cigarette filters are among the top types of litter volunteers collect from beaches during her organization's bi-annual beach sweeps.

She said some 725,578 cigarette filters have been picked up from the beaches since the sweeps started in 1985.

"Clearly the message that the beach is not an ashtray is not getting through to people," Zipf said. "There's no reason to smoke on the beach. It's beautiful."

She said that besides being unsightly, cigarette butts on the beach pose a health hazard to marine life that ingest the fibers and toxins from filters.

Last year, when he pocket-vetoed a similar bill, Christie said the issue should be left up to individual towns to decide whether they want a ban.

But Sweeney said Tuesday it's the role of the state Legislature to require statewide standards on smoking bans.

"This is one of those issues that we should do a statewide ban on," he said. "It just makes sense. It makes common sense."

The governor's office had no comment on the pending bill, said Brian Murray, a Christie spokesman.

John Weber, the mid-Atlantic regional manager for Surfrider Foundation, said cigarette butts are too small to be swept up by beach grooming machines, so they're often left behind to make their way into the ocean.

"Almost anywhere they're littered, there's a good chance they're going to end up on the beach even if they weren't littered on the beach," he said.

The measure, cosponsored by state Sens. Shirley Turner (D-Mercer) and Joseph Vitale (D-Middlesex), would not affect golf courses and would allow towns to carve out a section of beach for smoking. It would apply to cigars and e-cigarettes.

Matthew Doherty, mayor of Belmar where smoking has been banned on the beaches since 2014, said the prohibition has been a "positive" experience for the town.

"What we realized was that by banning smoking, you have a cleaner beach and also a significantly healthier beach, which draws more middle class families from throughout Monmouth County and New Jersey to come to the beach," Doherty said.

He said police officers in Belmar haven't had a problem enforcing it because most offenders cooperate when asked to put out their butts.