CHEYENNE - When the Lovell Town Council met in 2006 to ponder a public indoor smoking ban, supporters of the measure presumed the town's large, vice-shunning Mormon community would assure a slam dunk.

Wrong.

Faced with outspoken opposition from bar and restaurant owners, along with some who rejected the ban on principle, the council killed the proposed ordinance on the spot.

"I think what it boils down to is we are pretty independent here in Wyoming," said Lovell Mayor Bruce Morrison, who supported the proposal as a matter of public health safety. "And people don't like it when they perceive that you are encroaching on their individual freedoms."

Those same arguments - public health safety vs. the freedoms of smokers and business owners - could be at the center of a similar showdown in the upcoming session of the state Legislature.

The Labor, Health and Social Services Joint Interim Committee will decide whether to sponsor a smoke-free bill when it meets Dec. 1 in Cheyenne. Supporters are optimistic.

"I think people are ready for it," said Loretta Wolf, spokeswoman for the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network in Wyoming. "I think they feel this is the right time for Wyoming to go smoke-free."

Public supports smoke-free

Despite the setback in Lovell, and a similar failure in Casper in 2000, supporters of smoke-free regulations say momentum is building at the local level.

Cheyenne, Laramie, Evanston, Rock Springs, Green River, Afton and Burlington have all adopted smoke-free ordinances of varying potency.

In addition, statewide polls have shown that Wyoming voters support a ban on smoking in public buildings.

A 2006 poll by Mason-Dixon Polling & Research Inc., with a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points, found that 57 percent of Wyoming voters supported a comprehensive statewide indoor smoking ban.

A poll in 2007 by Harstad Strategic Research Inc. of Boulder Colo, with a margin of error of plus or minus 4.4 percentage points, showed that two-thirds of Wyoming voters supported a ban on smoking in all public places, including restaurants and bars.

Non-partisan issue?

Smoke-free supporters insist that health safety concerns justify a statewide law.

They got a boost in 2006 when the U.S. Surgeon General concluded that smoke-free workplaces are the only "effective way to eliminate second-hand smoke exposure in the workplace."

Smoke-free supporters also have the benefit of a growing organization in Wyoming. The American Cancer Society has been actively pushing for statewide legislation for years.

Judy Catchpole, former state schools superintendent under Republican Gov. Jim Geringer, has agreed to serve as chief lobbyist for the bill in 2009, Wolf said.

"We want to make sure that people understand that it's a non-partisan issue that affects everybody in the state," Wolf said.

The right to breathe

Smoke-free advocates also cite studies that show no net negative impact on the economies of Laramie and Cheyenne in the wake of smoke-free ordinances there.

The findings by the Wyoming Survey and Analysis Center at the University of Wyoming are consistent with similar studies across the nation, said Senior UW researcher Laura Feldman.

"There is no net negative impact from the implementation of smoke-free ordinances," Feldman said.

Lately, smoke-free advocates are turning their opponents' arguments about personal liberties against them.

They are increasingly focusing on the rights of non-smokers to breath clean air, rather than the rights of smokers and business owners to do as they please. The vast majority of Wyoming residents do not smoke.

"I think we are very interested in individual rights," Wolf said. "But we look at it from the point of view that the individual has a right to breath smoke-free air.

"Some people may have never thought of smoking in those terms before, but it does harm other people," Wolf added.

"Government mandate"

Opponents of the bill are less organized.

At the local level, opposition to smoke-free ordinances has mainly come from ad-hoc groups of bar and restaurant owners, and a handful of smokers. A smattering of strict libertarians have opposed the regulations on principle.

The Wyoming State Liquor Association, which represents about 1,300 liquor license holders, is probably the chief opponent of a statewide law.

"We have nothing to rival the large organization that the anti-smoking people have," said Mike Moser, association executive director. "But personally I would rather have hundreds of small businesses concerned about their livelihood on my side than special interests that are being paid for."

Businesses will suffer

Moser called the statewide smoke-free bill a "government mandate" that will unquestionably hurt businesses.

Economic studies that show otherwise are flawed, Moser said, because they fail to recognize that smoke-free laws encourage smokers to take home their beer, wine and liquor, instead of spending time at bars and clubs that rely on on-premises sales.

"It's not even a question to us that businesses will be hurt; that's a given, and jobs will be lost," Moser said. "The question is whether a government mandate " and that's what it is " is worth the sacrifice."

Moser said business owners have a right to dictate how they run their operations, and the market should decide whether bars and restaurants ban smoking.

In many cases that has already happened, he said. Eighty percent of Wyoming restaurants are smoke-free, because that's what customers in some areas want.

More will go that way in the future without a statewide law, he said.

In addition, Moser argued that opinion polls showing support for the bill are based on unfairly framed questions that lead participants toward a particular answer, he said.

"This is not a smoking issue," Moser added. "It is a business and personal rights issue."

Big hurdle in Senate

So far, the state Legislature has been unwilling to consider a statewide law.

A bill introduced in 2007 by Rep. Dan Zwonitzer, R-Cheyenne, died without a committee hearing.

Lawmakers went on the record for the first time last year, when they failed to provide the two-thirds vote of the House required during a budget session to introduce a similar bill by Rep. Lori Millin, D-Cheyenne.

But the 31-28 tally in favor of introduction did shed some light on where House members stand on the issue.

Despite changes in House membership next year, a similar vote would remain very close, a Star-Tribune analysis of the positions held by next year's freshman class showed.

The Senate, which is generally more critical of business regulation, probably poses a tougher obstacle.

"I think there will be some problems in the Senate with telling people and businesses operators and bars and so on what they can and cannot do," said Sen. Grant Larson, R-Jackson, a 14-year Senate member.

Exemptions for certain businesses might make the legislation more palatable, Larson said.

"It's still sickening"

Exemptions would also make the bill more palatable to bar owners, Moser said.

But smoke-free advocates have so far been unwilling to accept anything short of a comprehensive bill - and for good reason, Wolf said.

Food service workers, her group noted, have a significantly greater risk of dying of lung cancer than the general population, in part because of second-hand smoke exposure in the workplace.

"We feel very strongly that bars and all workers indoors should be included" in a smoke-free law, Wolf said.

About 20 states have passed smoke-free laws, including Wyoming's neighbors: Montana, Colorado, Idaho, Utah and South Dakota. Several have included exemptions for certain businesses.

In addition, town ordinances in Cheyenne, Rock Springs, Green River and Afton include varying exemptions for smoke shops, bars and private clubs.

The exemptions have created isolated conflicts.

Nina Nachtigall, owner of Eileen's Colossal Cookies in Cheyenne, said an exemption for smoke shops in Cheyenne's ordinance resulted in ongoing issues with a smoke lounge adjacent to her business in a strip mall.

Ventilation fans in the cookie shop sucked tobacco smoke into her business, Nachtigall said, endangering employees and potentially tainting Nachtigall's tasty products.

The problem was mostly remedied when the smoke lounge agreed to install its own large ventilation fans, but Nachtigall insists it's not a perfect solution.

"It's better than before but it's still sickening," she said.

Anything can happen

Nobody is predicting the fate of a smoke-free bill in 2009.

Rep. Jack Landon Jr., R-Sheridan, co-chairman of the Labor, Health and Social Services Joint Interim Committee, said he can't guarantee that his committee will even sponsor a bill.

"I think there are some (members) who would want to sponsor it, and I think there are others who are hesitant to," Landon said. "It's really emotional."

Individual lawmakers will carry the legislation if the committee rejects it, supporters have said.

Larson, the senator from Jackson, said the bill's chances have improved over previous years.

"The reasons are obvious," Larson said. "It is an important problem. There are all the arguments they make, which I think are valid, about general public welfare."

James Sanderson, the town administrator and attorney in Afton, learned earlier this year that when it comes to smoke-free laws, all bets are off.

Sanderson said he and many others expected the town council in Afton, another largely Mormon community in western Wyoming, to easily adopt a smoke-free ordinance in February.

After a big fight with business owners, and those wary of Big Brother, the council passed an ordinance with an exemption for bars.

Religion, it turned out, figured little in the debate, Sanderson said.

"People just don't like government telling them what to do."

Contact capital bureau reporter Jared Miller at (307) 632-1244 or jared.miller@trib.com

AT A GLANCE

About 20 states have adopted smoke-free laws, including most of Wyoming's neighbors. Many of those laws include exemptions for certain businesses:

- Delaware, New York, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island and Washington prohibit smoking in all private workplaces, restaurants, and bars.

- California, Colorado, Connecticut, Maine and Vermont prohibit smoking in all restaurants and bars.

- Arkansas and Idaho and prohibit smoking in all restaurants.

- Florida and Utah prohibit smoking in private workplaces and restaurants.

- Montana, North Dakota and South Dakota prohibit smoking in all private workplaces

- 18 states partially or totally prevent local communities from passing smoke-free air ordinances stronger than the statewide law.

Source: American Cancer Society