Corpus Christi Online - / IceRays opt to go smokeless

Marketplace \| Services \| Contact Us \| Community \| Arts & Leisure \| Local Guides

Friday, Jan. 8, 1999
IceRays opt to go smokeless
The story behind Coliseum's new rule
Brent Schrotenboer
Staff Writer

   In a curtly worded press release issued late Thursday afternoon by team general manager James Garino, the Corpus Christi IceRays suddenly announced that a bold new smoking policy was going to be enacted during Thursday night's game at Memorial Coliseum.
   What it said was this: Smoking will no longer be permitted on the Coliseum concourse. From "this day forward," smokers will be directed outside the arena. If they wish to return to the game, smokers will then need to receive a designated hand stamp before firing up their cigarettes outdoors.
   Good policy. Good move. Good way to start the new year with a smoke-free dose of clean, fresh breathing room.
   As for the sudden change of plans, however, the timing seems to be a just little bit too centered around a knee-jerk reaction to potentially bad publicity.
   Consider the following chain of events:
   On Monday afternoon, Coliseum manager John Simon said that he hadn't heard a single complaint about the smoke that filled the air on the concourse during hockey games.
   No one had even talked to him about changing the policy before Wednesday. There didn't seem to be any reason to change it in the meantime, and it wasn't until Monday that anybody had really even raised the issue about the policy during games.
   That was when the questions starting coming in from a certain local reporter trying to figure out why team and Coliseum officials have chosen to remain one of only two buildings in a 17-team hockey league that still allows smoking inside its building doors.
   In a city-owned venue where hundreds of men, women and children sift their way through the concourse during games, another pressing question for the powers-that-be at Memorial Coliseum seemed even more appropriate:
   Why do they continue to allow smoking there when City Hall, both shopping malls and almost every other place of public gathering remains off limits to smoke, ashes and lighted cigarettes?
   Valid questions. Good points. Strange way to operate in the smoke-free era of public policy.
   What happened next seems to qualify for one of the most timely moves of preemptive policy-making in recent hockey history.
   While the reporter worked his story on the subject late Tuesday night (OK, it was me) - hey, guess what happened? - the powers-that-be suddenly made a last-minute, 180-degree change with their smoking policy.
   At least that's the way that everything seems to appear.
   Around 4:00 o'clock Thursday afternoon, the fax came through saying the policy change was going to be effective immediately. The next game started at 7:05. The story was supposed to run on Friday.
   Even though they may have inconvenienced hundreds of smokers with their last-minute change of plans, by making the change effective on Thursday, they nixed a story that might be considered "critical" on Friday.
   Chalk it up as a case of brilliant - if not questionable - timing. Though Garino has always maintained that he wanted to change the policy from the start, the reason he said that he couldn't was that Coliseum management told him that it would require too much more security and cost to monitor the re-entrance of smoking fans to the building.
   Only a day or two after the questions started rolling on Monday - presto! - he then suddenly seemed discover the ever-wondrous method of applying ink hand stamps to smoking patrons who might want to return inside after firing up their cigarettes outdoors.
   Brent Schrotenboer can be reached at 886-3615 or through e-mail at schrotenboerb@scripps.com. He also can be heard every Wednesday between 8-9 a.m. on KCCT-AM 1150.

Post your comments on this story in our forums.