SMC Becomes Smoke Free

The week before our spring break and as you may have read in last week's Corsair, the Associated Students of Santa Monica College elected a new board and in doing that they also asked the students to vote on making SMC a smoke-free campus or to create special places on campus for smokers.

The Corsair is ready to fully back this decision when it goes into effect sometime by the end of this semester or the beginning of the fall semester. Students at SMC who have been screaming and yelling that the smoking population at SMC is giving them cancer and they don't want to study or enjoy their lunch in a cloud full of dark smoke. So finally the AS stepped in and made the decision that it was time to step in and give the students a say and the students spoke up and voted to make the campus smoke free.

The fear, or for some the happiness, became true on Sunday April 10. The message was sent that smokers will now have to move off campus to enjoy a cigarette. SMC will become smoke free by the beginning of the fall semester and SMC's police department will give warnings and tickets to smokers who do not respect the new rules.

Now you as a smoker may be angry and ask how can they do this? They did not do anything that your friends and/or enemies did not vote for in the election. If you did vote you can scream and yell as much as you like. If you did not vote you will just have to tell your friends and your significant other that you will be back in a second or two and, in a James Bond type of maneuver, smoke on campus just like you may have done when you smoked in high school on campus.

The AS gave smokers and non smokers the chance to create smoking areas on campus and the smokers continued to not show up to the voting booth and will now have to move off campus or possibly risk getting a ticket for smoking on campus.