Panel finalizes tobacco resolution

July 24, 2012 at 12:00a.m.

COLUMBUS

College student and faculty smokers, take note.

The Ohio Board of Regents finalized a resolution Monday urging the state’s colleges and universities to adopt tobacco-free policies on their campuses, which could mean no smoking, chewing or otherwise consuming related products in dormitories, outdoor spaces or any other areas.

The resolution, OK’d on a unanimous vote, is symbolic rather than policy setting.

The regents have no authority to implement such plans; college and university boards of trustees have to develop and finalize their own tobacco- or smoke-free policies.

But Regents Chairman James Tuschman said he hopes the resolution will mark the start of discussions and debates on individual campuses and the eventual adoption of tobacco prohibitions at the state’s 14 four-year universities, two dozen regional campuses, 23 community colleges, the Northeast Ohio Medical University and other higher education locations.

“What we’re trying to do is modify behavior,” Tuschman said. “This is the way we think is the way to do that. Will we succeed in every respect? I don’t know. It’s going to be very interesting... how these campuses debate and consider this. ... Our job here is to raise the issues, is to bring forward what we think is a leadership position.”

Smoking already is banned in many university campus buildings, thanks to the constitutional amendment OK’d by voters several years ago that prohibited smoking in public places.

But Smoke Free Ohio law does not cover dorm rooms or open spaces on campuses.

More than half a dozen colleges and universities in the state, including Malone College and Miami University, have implemented extended smoking or tobacco prohibitions to cover such areas.