Butts Out at The Blairs
Smoke 'em if you got 'em, at least until January 1, 2007, if you live at The Blairs apartment complex.
A November memo sent to residents says that smoking will be prohibited inside all apartments and outside The Blairs' buildings, except in designated areas. The 1,400-unit complex along East-West Highway and Colesville Road will be the county's first residential development to go smoke-free, writes The Gazette.
"It would be safer and healthier," Elizabeth Lisboa, the landlord's spokesperson, told The Gazette. Last year, two people at The Blairs died in an apartment fire attributed to a smoldering cigarette.
The memo also says that no lease will be renewed unless the tenant agrees to sign a "smoke-free lease addendum."
"I had to sign it and I don't agree with it," one resident told The Gazette. "There are a lot of other things that should be managed instead of policing the smoking ban."
D.C. Hughs, a ten-year resident, says that he contacted County Councilmember George Leventhal (at large) about the matter. According to Hughs, the councilmember said that smokers were not a "protected class" under the law, The Gazette writes.
County law forbids discrimination on the basis of race, sex, disability or sexual orientation.
"We're trying to do the right thing," Lisboa says. "Obviously, you can't please everyone."
Mmmm ... Peeps!
"Apartment Complex to Snuff Out Smoking" (The Gazette)
2 comments:
Actually, the national protected classes (via the Fair Housing Act) are race, color, religion, national origin, sex, elderliness, familial status and disability. States, counties and cities may add other protected classes such as Moco did with sexual orientation.
For the life of me, I can't understand why smokers continue to want to destroy their own lives and risk those of others...all for the sake of claiming their right to smoke. And I don't want to hear any of that "well, the next thing you know, they'll bank drinking". That argument just doesn't fly. Smoking kills and the overwhelming evidence supports this. Just quit and save yourself and others before it is too late.
Thanks for the clarification, Anonymous.
Allow me to pick your legal brain a little further:
Does the state of Maryland or Montgomery County consider drug addiction a disability?
If so, can nicotine addicts (ie, smokers) claim to have a disability? Could their nicotine addiction make them a protected class?
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