Laramie County, Wyoming won't pursue countywide smoking ban, plus article on Natroma County, WY

It's great to still see occasional defeats like this for once. Too bad this one seems to be more on a technicality, due to the fact Teton County's Board of Health rammed through a total smoking ban(despite the fact that ONLY one bar in that entire county permitted smoking!), and that one bar is currently challenging the Teton County BoH in a state court case. :)

Just for the record, the city of Laramie, Wyoming is NOT within Laramie County. Laramie County does contain the city of Cheyenne, Wyoming, which has had a citywide comprehensive smoking ban including bars in effect since August 2006.

http://www.wyomingnews.com/articles/2010/10/11/news/19local_10-11-10.txt (includes a decent comments section)

Turns out when I did a little more digging for Wyoming articles, I suddenly noticed the Casper-Natroma County Board of Health is now looking into this idea, all because Laramie County's Board of Health brought up this issue. Bastards.....

http://trib.com/news/local/article_8d687493-ffba-5629-bb25-62e9350173ba.html (includes very lengthy comments section)
http://billingsgazette.com/news/state-and-regional/wyoming/article_9b2ca4a8-e0b5-11df-b005-001cc4c03286.html

Galveston, TX finally reverses their ban for bars, and becomes the 2nd Texas city to restore freedom of choice in 2010

It's way past time that more cities with total bans including bars should reverse them, and good to see at least another Texas city had the balls to ease a smoking ban that formerly applied to bars. This is the 2nd city in Texas in 2010 to make this decision, after Conroe, TX(north of Houston) did so earlier this year. Although the ban inside restaurants and workplaces will remain in effect after October 13th, the provision that banned smoking 15 feet from a door was revised to just 5 feet, and alcohol consumption is once again allowed in tobacco shops, along with indoor smoking in bars and clubs, if such a owner wishes to permit it. Galveston previously had one of THE most restrictive smoking bans in Texas, and their ban briefly was even more restrictive and prohibited smoking in tobacco shops, before a December 2009 smoking ban amendment passed. (but then still prohibiting alcohol consumption in such places) Up until this revision passed, smoking in all restaurants and bar patios was technically banned, although it was NEVER enforced, as witnessed by anyone who's ever watched the webcam for the restaurant The Spot. (and can be viewed at http://www.galveston.com/spotcam/ )

Almost forgot to say Pasadena, TX(an east suburb of Houston) did a similar ban reversal for deciding to remove bars from their smoking ban, which occurred 2-3 years ago. Bravo to Galveston's city council, and yay for the fact it overrode Mayor Jaworski's veto!

http://www.cityofgalveston.org/news/default.cfm?ID=4219
http://www.setexasrecord.com/news/225095-galveston-bar-owners-strike-back-at-smoking-ban-by-suing-city

Two additional articles I just found:
http://galvestondailynews.com/story/178330 (and wow, did Michael McFadden seriously own the idiot antis that commented in that comments section, up to 62 at the time I saw it)
http://blogs.houstonpress.com/hairballs/2010/09/smoking_ban_galveston_1.php

Naaa Naaa Naaa Naaa, Hey Hey Hey, Goodbye(to at least one Smoking Ban)

Just as my favorite AL baseball team(Chicago White Sox) always plays whenever an opposing starting pitcher is removed from the game, I figured the catchy title for this post is appropriate after I just caught this news slightly late. Boone County has finally pulled out of the talks for a regional smoking ban proposal in Northern Kentucky, joining Grant County(which includes both Dry Ridge and Williamstown, off of I-75 as you go south of both Boone and Kenton County towards Lexington) in saying no to any misguided regional smoking ban proposals. Looks like Campbell County Judge-Executive Steve Pendery, and soon-to-retire Kenton County Judge-Executive Ralph Drees will lose after all in their pathetic attempts to pass smoking bans for just their own county, even if not the whole NKY region.

Three cheers, and many more, to common sense getting at least one win over anti-smoking zealotry! Hopefully the city councils of Indianapolis(ahem, City-County Council of Indianapolis-Marion County) and San Antonio(both cities are where antis have been doing renewed pushes for citywide bans) will wake up and say no to bans, along with the several places I can think of where smoking ban referendums are already on the November 2010 ballot(San Angelo, TX, Jefferson City, MO, and the state of South Dakota).

http://news.cincinnati.com/article/20100730/NEWS0103/307300081/Boone-pulls-out-of-smoking-ban-talks