One Step Removed, Lobby’s Still Effective

The state’s small grocers were indignant over recent news accounts that seemed to question their motivation for a bill penalizing teens who use tobacco.

The stories suggested the nation’s powerful tobacco lobby - not associations of grocers - were the real backers of House Bill 1746. The measure seeks to penalize kids caught smoking as a way of holding them accountable for this self-destructive act. But it goes on to make it more difficult to penalize store owners for selling to kids.

And it effectively eliminates sting operations funded by state government but often conducted by local anti-smoking advocacy groups. They are an effective but - for the merchants - irritating means of finding stores that routinely peddle cigarettes to kids.

Attorney General Christine Gregoire says HB 1746 is a tobacco industry measure masquerading as an anti-smoking bill. On the surface it looks like an attempt to get tough on smokers, but underneath, it carves away at effective local anti-smoking programs, she said.

‘Every time we try to get an effective program, they try to undermine it,” Gregoire said. She notes that tobacco companies give lots of money to state candidates but, because they aren’t trusted by the general public, they are reluctant to lobby a bill like HB 1746 directly. So, Gregoire claims, they find others to lead the way - like small grocers.

Is it a coincidence that the lobbyist for the small grocers also represents R.J. Reynolds in Olympia? Is it a coincidence that the tobacco lobbyists were in the room while the bill was easily passing the House and Senate commerce and labor committees? Yet tobacco didn’t testify and made no outward attempts to lobby for the bills.

“They’re good at getting allies - I think with falsehoods,” Gregoire said.

Not so, said Hank Armour, president of the Washington State Association of Neighborhood Stores. “Neighborhood stores share common interests with a variety of consumer product makers - soft drinks, beer and wine, groceries, gasoline and yes, tobacco - because these are the products we sell the most,” he continued.

If the big tobacco-small grocers alliance were isolated to Washington state, Armour’s defense would be more convincing. But a national report by a coalition of the American Heart Association, American Lung Association and anti-smoking organizations suggests the connection is widespread and intentional. It notes a pattern of teen smoking bills pushed by other groups that match a model bill written by the tobacco industry. The report also found frequent connections between groups like small grocers and tobacco.

“The reason for this strategy is obvious: these front groups have far more credibility with the public than the tobacco industry has or ever will have,” the report stated. “The industry is also then able to have its spokespersons note in the media that it is not really playing a role in the lobbying on the bill.”

The report says industry-backed bills had several aspects in common. They seek to fine kids caught smoking, make the seller liable only if they knowingly committed the offense, make employees rather than owners liable for illegal sales and reduce the ability to enforce and enact laws locally. All are contained in HB 1746.

Even more interesting were memos the study included. One, by the Food Marketing Institute’s state issues office, details teen smoking bills it says were drafted by the tobacco industry.

“Grocery retailers and state retail associations need to work with representatives from the tobacco industry to assure that balanced legislation is passed,” the memo concludes.

Another, from the Indiana Retail Grocers Association, suggested retailers retaliate against groups like the Cancer Society for their opposition to a bill to reign in sting operations. “If you are still doing fund raisers for these people, I would again strongly recommend you Stop!,” the Indiana memo says.

This wouldn’t be the first time Washington’s anti-youth-smoking efforts were softened by tobacco lobbying. The 1993 bill that set up the program was watered down to allow some free distribution of tobacco and to stop local governments from adopting tougher ordinances.

The 1997 bill is no sure thing. Gov. Gary Locke is not happy that a tougher bill he and Gregoire pushed languished in the same committees that easily passed HB 1746.

But Gregoire and others who have done battle with big tobacco do not expect the issue will go away should Locke pull out an already well-used veto pen.

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The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Peter Callaghan McClatchy News Service