This is an article that I found on PGA.com. Apparently San Francisco is REAL close to banning smoking on their public courses. I am not a smoker nor do I play in the San Fran area, but I think this ban is a little overboard if you ask me. How can they go about banning smoking on a public golf course but you can walk down their public sidewalks and light one up where there are hundreds of people walking next you at one time?? This is stupid!!!

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- San Francisco is a step closer to banning smoking on the city's public golf courses.

The Board of Supervisors narrowly approved an ordinance to ban smoking on the five public courses the city operates. The measure still needs to be signed by Mayor Gavin Newsom before it takes effect.

The legislation was approved last month by the board's Neighborhood Services Committee as part of a broader plan to limit smoking in public places.

Some city officials worry that the ban will hurt business at city golf courses.

I don't know about this one, the only problem I see is if two strangers share a golf cart and one is a smoker and the other is not.

Besides that, its not like you can smell cigars or cigarettes if they are not in your own group.

You mean you CAN'T smell cigars and cigarettes from three fairways over?

If I recall correctly, California has eliminated smoking in most public buildings, so I guess this would be the next step along that path. As a non-smoker and an asthmatic, I think its great.

-Thomas

Oh well,

Looks like i won't be making any road trips to San Fran to play any munis there soon!

Sounds great. Get rid of the smell of smoke (if you can actually smell it) so it doesn't faintly hurt someone, but keep those beer carts running, so that someone can have 4 or 5 on the course, a couple more at the 19th hole, and then hopefully innocently drive home, and not killl someone's kid. But hey, he wasn't smoking!

I suppose if your olfactory challenged you can't. I can smell them from a long ways a way, that may have something to do with the fact that I'm an ex-smoker.

As much as I now detest the smell, I'm not sure this is a very good idea. I think a better approach would be something along the lines of, "Tuesdays and Thursdays Smoke Free Golfing". You know kind of break into it gradually and leave the smokers a viable option.

This is just another instance of government trying to run indivudaul lives. We really need to stop government running our lives. Next thing you know they will be moderating how much meat we can eat since it has cholestrol.

This is stupid.

Sooner or later the people have to stand up and be heard that we are fed up with the government telling us what to do.

I don't smoke cigarettes. Never have. Hate cigarette smoke. If I'm driving down the road and there's someone in the car in front of me smoking, I can smell it. Can't stand that.

But, on a big golf course? I don't care who is smoking. We're outside. If you look up and see the sky, go smoke away.

Just don't flick your cigarette butts all over the course please. Throw them in a garbage can.
This isn't Caddyshack. And you're not Tony D'nunzio.

I agree; I love how we pick and choose who we're going to regulate. I can sympathize with an indoors and airplane smoking ban, but outside?? You also can't smoke at SF beaches...I thought we lived in America.

If it's a problem with butts on the course, enforce the littering rules that are already out there. Smokers are singled out because they're in the minority and generally disliked by non-smokers...I still think that personal liberties and choices should be made by the individual, even if those choices lead to infirmities.

Keep regulating smokers...pretty soon they'll start taxing fast food. (The slope isn't that slippery)

Isn't it pretty safe to say there are plenty of people out there that just need a cause to make themselves feel better? I like being able to go to a restaurant or bar and not have it be smoke filled, but banning it outdoors seems pretty silly to me. A priveate course I could see, but not a public course.

A little clarification. SF is trying to extend current smoking bans to more public places, so they are going after parks. There is already a smking ban within 25ft of any park that has a plyground, they want to extend to all parks. The golf courses in SF are part of parks and rec so the ban would extend there.

I don't care one way or the other on the ban, but I doubt it hurts business. Weather and course conditions affect most of the play on the courses other than Harding, and Harding is always pretty full.

Boy I would have to disagree about a smoking ban hurting their business. I think it would put a drastic cut on their profits.. I know some players that would shoot like crap if they weren't puffing on a cigarette or cigar. Can you imagine some of the champions tour players like Dana Quigley without being able to hit the stogie. I am unfortunately a dipper and I can't imagine playing a whole round without a chew. God that is sad but it is true. Hell I am convinced that is 50% of David Duval's problem is that he quit dippin. But the other point here is that the courses will still have problems with players sneaking around smoking which then involves employee time to go out there and tell them to quit it or kick them off the course. Or you could go the next step where they could even involve law enforcement for an ordinance violation which nobody wants to see. It is too much of a hassle in my mind to go and do something like this.

There's just not that many smokers out here. Maybe 5% of golfers?

Harding will probably get the most complainers because they are the busiest, but whatever tee times get cancelled by complainers will get filled quickly.

Sharp is a pit, whomever lights up way past the clubhouse, no one will care.

Lincoln/Gleneagles maybe a few crusty old guys will get bent, but since they can't smoke in bars anyway, they are used to being told too bad.

Golden Gate is low key, very family-oriented, not a lot of smokers.

If this was anywhere else it would be a very big deal, but SF is kooky. Gay marriages are a lot more important than smoking, that's how twisted this area is.

I can just see some marshall telling a guy in jeans/t-shirt, "Hey, no smoking"...uh okay, the guy puts it out, the marshall leaves, he lights up again. And a cop answering a call about smoking in SF ?!?!? They are too busy making videos making fun of the gays.

Apparently not much happening legislative-wise in the city these days eh? I would think smoking and non-smoking carts would be more like it. Non smoking carts would be just like they are now, smoking carts would have the seating area enclosed in a plastic bubble so none of the smoke would escape into the atmosphere. Of course it could get hard to see, much less breathe but with city financed HEPA filtration systems attached to the top of the cart that'd solve that problem. This way the politicians can raise taxes and the smokers get to keep smoking and everybody can grumble.

The first time I ever flew into California was to LA. I had heard that there was no smoking indoors anywhere. Fair enough. But as we approached the air space around LA, I thought to myself, seeing the freeways, big SUV's with one person in it, alllllll the cars, and mostly the smog that hung in the sky, Yep, I totally understand why smoking is the issue. Keep people from worrying about what is REALLY causing all the smog.

That's funny, "hot box" golf carts!

It would be like that scene in Up in Smoke where Cheech and Chong are driving down the highway with the windows down and smoke streaming out of them.

I can smell smoke from 100's of yards away.. happens when you grow up with a parent that smoked..past tense since they have stopped. Anyways there is a city in NorCal ( DUBLIN, CA) that is actually thinking of calling secondhand smoke a public nuisance.

I personally dont like seeing cigar peices and cig butts near tees and greens..so I am all for stoping smoking on course. Besides FIRE season is coming and in my area it's getting dry already.

The thing I dislike is people smoking on the driving range. Hitting balls in close proximity makes it annoying. I could definitely do without catching a nice breeze of cigar smoke two holes over as well. I find smoking the most pointless act anyways, so I'm all for the ban.

Oh, and to the guy who said the beer cart is worse, of course it is. I'm surprised more people don't get pulled over when leaving the course.

I have got to say that is very impressive if you can smell smoke 100s of yards away on a golf course. I've grown up with a parent that smoked and I don't have that ability. Truly incredible even since smoke rises. I mean I can see at a range with a breeze, but 100s of yards, what do you play in a hurricane?

It all balances out. What you might not have known is Johnny can't see.

Oh don't you worry, I enforce golf courses big time when I am working. We have a local Muni in the area that has some hardcore league nights and all their doing is socializing and drinking. Well I have a nice driveway about 100 yards down the road from the courses driveway I sit in. When I see a car pulling out of there late after the leagues without stopping before pulling out on the road, that is an instant traffic stop. If I worked that course hard on league nights which is Monday through Thursday without having other calls to answer, I could pull out 5 DUI's a week there. Funny thing is that the dumbasses haven't realized that some of their buddies have been stopped for the same violation and been arrested. Seem they would catch on and stop at the end of the driveway and see if Po Po is down the road. Nah that would require some brains.