Apartment owners pushed to butt out

San Diego County officials have stepped behind a push by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to encourage apartment-building owners to ban smoking anywhere on their properties.

Last month, HUD released ”Change is in the Air,” a 100-page report outlining the process owners of rentals can take to push cigarette smoke out of their properties.

"Research has shown that ventilation and other air filtration technologies to control the movement of secondhand smoke between units in multi-family properties is ineffective and cannot eliminate the health risks caused by secondhand smoke exposure," warns a county release.

The report encourages owners by arguing that renovation of units occupied by smokers is significantly costlier and time-consuming than those of non-smokers, that the risk of fires is reduced by implementing a no-smoking policy, and that 79 percent of renters (and even 23 percent of smokers) say they'd support a ban on smoking indoors or within 25 feet of building entries and windows.

Cities throughout the county have taken steps over the years to push cigarettes out of the public sphere. But even El Cajon, which has the most comprehensive local smoking ban, limits its official ban on residential smoking to apartment common areas. While they must abide by minimum standards set by local government, landlords are free to create more restrictive policies should they elect to do so.