Bridgeport debates hiking cigarette sale age

Smoke ‘em if you got ‘em — and if you are at least 21 years old, according to a proposed local law heading to Bridgeport’s City Council.

The council’s Ordinance Committee last week voted 4 to 3 to make Bridgeport the second municipality in Connecticut to raise the age limit for purchasing cigarettes, ecigarettes and other natural or synthetic tobacco products from 18 to 21.

Hartford was the first in the state to enact similar legislation in October.

“What we are proposing is really to restrict the access of youths ... to these products,” Maritza Bond, Bridgeport’s health director, told the committee. She cited a 2017 Connecticut Youth Tobacco Survey that found younger teenagers have access to such products through older high school friends.

“We’re not really trying to target current smokers,” Bond added.

But the proposal, scheduled for a Jan. 22 public hearing, was watered down following a debate sparked by some council members with nicotine habits. Councilman Marcus Brown, a committee co-chairman and smoker, successfully amended the age increase to exempt anyone 18 years old as of the date the law would take effect if approved by the full council.

“What happens to the 20-year-old (who has been) smoking for two years?” Brown said in defense of his change, adding later: “We are literally telling people what they can or cannot do at an age they were doing it already.”

Brown’s amendment mirrored a bill debated this year by the state legislature to prohibit cigarette sales statewide to those under 21. That legislation did not pass, leaving the matter up to individual cities and towns to regulate.

Bond vowed in an interview after the Ordinance Committee’s approval of Brown’s amendment to lobby the full council to restore the stricter 21-and-older rule before final passage.

“I have a 20-year-old and a 16-year-old,” Bond said. “I would not want them to be addicted at such a young age.”

That is the case she and other supporters of the age increase made — that it will strengthen a nationwide effort to prevent youths from taking up smoking and those that already do to perhaps kick the habit.

Councilman Peter Spain, who said his father died from lung cancer that had spread to his brain, argued that Bridgeport, by joining hundreds of other cities nationwide that have changed the legal age for purchasing tobacco, will be part of “a cultural shift.”

“We’re moving the needle,” Spain told the Ordinance Committee. He, and two noncommittee members — Councilman Kyle Langan and Council President Aidee Nieves sponsored the proposed age increase.

But Brown and Councilman Ernie Newton, another smoker, were skeptical of any positive impact the higher age limit would have.

“I’ll support this legislation but we’ve passed a lot of legislation that don’t stop people from doing what they want to do,” Newton said. “The black market is gonna have a field day. ... If they (residents under 21) do have a nicotine problem, they’re going to find what they’re looking for and they ain’t gonna go to no treatment.”

Brown said 18-year-olds will simply ask 21-year-olds to purchase cigarettes for them.

“It’s not as if we’re inflicting something on these young people,” Spain said, pushing back against Brown’s amendment. “We shouldn’t have ‘the Bridgeport exception’.”

Langan said that he smoked when he was younger and “got my cigarettes from an 18year-old I knew.” He said he was uncomfortable offering an exemption because, as a teacher, he wanted to do whatever he can to protect his students’ health and safety.

But, Langan admitted, he understood Brown’s point about expecting addicted smokers of a certain age to quit because they can suddenly no longer legally buy tobacco products: “You can’t tell that person to stop. They can’t stop.”

Brown also said he is worried about the impact on local businesses. And Newton also argued that 18-year-olds can enlist in the military.

Councilwoman Michelle Lyons told Newton that joining the military and smoking “are choices — but one becomes an addiction. I will be in favor of anything that can protect our youth.”

Brown, Newton, Councilwoman Rosalina Roman-Christy and Brown’s committee cochair, Councilwoman Eneida Martinez, all voted for the amended age limit law. Spain, Lyons and Councilwoman Maria Valle opposed it because it had been altered.