Stores doing a good job preventing youth from getting tobacco products
Published in the July 9-23, 2014 issue of Morgan Hill Life
By Staff Report
Photo by Marty Cheek
Kyle Nguyen, a member of the Community Advocate Teens of Today, and Kristi Shiau with Breathe California speak to dignitaries.
When it comes to activities keeping its citizens free from the health-risk impacts of tobacco, Morgan Hill received the top score of all cities in Santa Clara County in the 2013-2014 Community’s Health on Tobacco Report Card released at a press conference at the Morgan Hill City Hall plaza June 26.
Joking with the audience, Morgan Hill Mayor Steve Tate said that the city deserves a grade of “A-plus” instead of just an “A” for having such a high total score on the report card. He described the significance of the grade for the city, which received a grade of “F” in 2011.
“The whole council said that just isn’t acceptable,” he said. “We had some very limited resources within our police department, but the police did start going out and doing some kinds of compliance checks in the community. And we built it up over the years so that we are where we are now at the top of the list.”
In April, the City Council passed a tobacco retail license ordinance requiring every business in Morgan Hill that sells tobacco to pay fees for a sales license from the city. Money from the license is used to fund the enforcement of youth tobacco sales laws.
“The enforcement is so much more effective when you can do that,” Tate said. “The huge decrease in the sales has just been phenomenal.”
Morgan Hill has various smoking policies such as laws prohibiting smoking in both indoor dining and outdoor dining areas at restaurants, and ordinances requiring the city’s parks and recreation facilities are completely tobacco free, he said.
One of the report card’s goals is to provide recommendations to cities in the county on activities that can reduce youth access and exposure to tobacco products and thus help prevent use and addiction to these products. The report card is a tool used to grade each jurisdiction in areas that include enforcement of tobacco sales laws (particularly tobacco sales to minors), level of retail compliance with local, state and federal tobacco laws, and the strength of local tobacco-control policies to prevent youth access to tobacco products.
With a total score of 111 points, Morgan Hill received the top score in the 2013-2014 Tobacco Report Card sponsored by the Tobacco Free Coalition of Santa Clara County, the Community Advocate Teens of Today and the Santa Clara County Public Health Department. Gilroy received a D grade with a score of 61 points.
The report attributed Gilroy’s low grade to “budget deficits and accompanying staff shortages” which prevented enforcement staff at the city from completing an adequate number of decoy operations on tobacco-sale retailers, said Carol Baker, co-chair of the Tobacco Free Coalition of Santa Clara County.
“For this reason … I urge the Gilroy City Council and all cities of Santa Clara County to consider a tobacco retail license program that is self funding and can cover the costs of enforcement.”
Kyle Nguyen, a member of the Community Advocate Teens of Today, a youth coalition dedicated to the anti-tobacco movement, described how he was involved in a decoy operation in which he went to 25 stores in East San Jose and Los Altos.
“Overall, the stores are doing a very good job preventing tobacco sales among the youth,” he said.
The next step is to expand CATT throughout schools in the Bay Area to get more kids involved in the anti-tobacco movement,” he said.
Another young person speaking at the press conference, Piedmont High School student Kristi Shiau, who is part of Breathe California’s Youth Advocate program, said that she volunteers as a Youth Tobacco Prevention Mentor for middle school students. She talks to them about tobacco advertising and how to be assertive in declining tobacco products when they are with their friends and discusses the many harms of tobacco to their health.
“I’m so glad that I’m in this program because I get the chance to educate kids about the harms of tobacco so they can grow up avoiding it,” she said. “They can better relate to me than they would a teacher or their parents.”
OTHER CITY RANKINGS
City Points
Campbell (A) 110
Mt. View (A) 95
San Jose (A) 92
Milpitas (A) 91
Saratoga (A) 91
Cupertino (B) 80
Los Altos (B) 80
Los Gatos (B) 80
Palo Alto (B) 80
Santa Clara (B) 80
Sunnyvale (B) 80
Gilroy (D) 61
Santa Clara County as a whole got an A grade with 110 points.
