Pending the results of a survey, the University of Idaho could make the switch to a smoke-free campus.
Savannah Bettis interned at the Lewiston Health Department and helped produce a survey asking students faculty and staff their opinions about smoking on campus.
“Does the school want a smoke-free campus?” she said. “If so there are a lot of different options. Now we have the 25-foot rule but the thing is it’s hard to enforce. A lot of schools have banned smoking because it’s so hard to enforce areas.”
Bettis said responses so far have been largely in favor of banning smoking on campus.
“Lots of responses are saying they have smoke blowing in from windows or have to walk through a cloud of smoke to get to work,” Bettis said. “A lot of people replied that they have submitted to facilities saying it was an unsafe environment because they are breathing second-hand smoke all day.”
Bettis said Boise State University recently banned smoking from its campus, but now has an issue at the outer rims where people smoke in large groups.
“For us that would be Paradise Creek and the bike path,” Bettis said, adding that there has already been an increase of people smoking along the path.
Bettis said the survey does not have a specific end date because of the low response rate.
“The survey was supposed to go out in the weekly email by Samantha Perez but she forgot to include it,” Bettis said. “The staff received it in an email so most of the responses have been from them.”
The survey will be open at least until the end of May because Bettis said she hopes more people will respond before the results are complied and potentially used to propose a new campus policy.
The survey can be found at surveymonkey.com/s/5QS6MFS
Katy Sword can be reached at [email protected]