Recorded presentation

Greg DeLaurier, PhD, Department of Work Environment, University of Massachusetts Lowell, 99 Oxford St., #1, Arlington, MA 02474, 781-648-5097, gdelaurier@comcast.net

NYCOSH was instrumental in the passage of the recent New York City worksite smoking ban, which effectively bans tobacco use in all bars and restaurants. NYCOSH testified before the New York City Council on behalf of the bill and garnered the support of a disparate collection of New York City Unions – from Local 1199 National Health and Human Services Employees Union to United Automobile Workers Region 9A and many others – for this bill. NYCOSH also actively worked for passage of New York's Statewide Smoke-Free Worksites Law. The Organized Labor and Tobacco Control Network helped create a linkage between NYCOSH and the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids that resulted in CTFK awarding NYCOSH a $25,000 grant to work with unions and the tobacco control community on issues such as secondhand smoke. In particular, NYCOSH will work to elicit support for both the city and statewide smoking bans. On March 28, 2003, for example, NYCOSH sent a letter to union leaders throughout the state educating them about both the New York City and New York State smoke-free worksite bans and the importance of the issue of secondhand smoke to working families. This cooperation may be a model for how to effect more general, and needed, labor/public health cooperation, and thus merits close examination. This is one of three specific case-studies of labor-tobacco control cooperation to be presented as part of the session.

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