(a) Purpose. The purpose of this section is to reduce the ability of minors to purchase cigarettes by eliminating self-service displays in the city.
(b) Findings.
(1) Each year four hundred thousand Americans die prematurely from tobacco-related illnesses. Tobacco use has been linked to cancer, emphysema, heart disease and a variety of other life-threatening health problems.
(2) These health problems create a burden for local communities, and more specifically for the city. In addition to the health care cost for these diseases, there is the lost human and economic contributions of each individual who suffers from the preventable effects of tobacco use.
(3) The 1994 National Household Survey on Drug Abuse showed that ninety percent of tobacco users start well before the age of eighteen, the average child smoker started at age thirteen, while the average age for smokeless tobacco initiation is nine years. According to the California State Department of Health Services Tobacco Control System, while adult tobacco use has been declining, youth use has been rising.
(4) All fifty states, and the District of Columbia, prohibit the sale of tobacco products to minors. California State Penal Code Sections 308(a) and 308(b) prohibit the sale of tobacco products and paraphernalia to minors and possession of tobacco by a minor, yet over twenty-nine million packs of cigarettes are sold to California children annually.
(5) The Synar Amendment to the 1992 Alcohol, Drug Abuse and Mental Health Reorganization Act requires that states reduce sales of cigarettes to minors to below twenty percent by the year 2000 or lose federal drug and alcohol funding.
(6) California’s rate of sales of cigarettes to minors is still twenty-one percent. Studies show that over forty percent of grade school students who smoked daily have shoplifted cigarettes, at some time, from self-service displays and that sales to minors drop by between forty percent and eighty percent after enactment of ordinances requiring vendor-assisted sales of tobacco products.
(7) Similar legislation in other counties and cities in California have reduced youth access to tobacco products without negatively affecting businesses.
(c) Definitions. For the purposes of this section, unless otherwise apparent from the context, certain words and phrases used in this section are defined as follows:
“Business” means a fixed location, whether indoors or outdoors, at which merchandise is offered for sale at retail.
“Minor” means any person under eighteen years of age.
“Self-service displays” means open displays of tobacco products and point-of-sale tobacco promotional products that the public has access to without the intervention of a store employee.
“Tobacco product” means any tobacco cigarette, cigar, pipe tobacco, smokeless tobacco or any other form of tobacco or tobacco product which may be used for smoking, chewing, inhalation or other means of ingestion.
“Vendor-assisted” means only a store owner or employee shall have access to the tobacco product and assist the customer by supplying the product. The customer may not take possession of the product until after it is purchased.
(d) Identification Required. No retailer or vendor shall sell or permit to be sold cigarettes or other tobacco products to an individual without requesting and examining photographic identification establishing the purchaser’s age as eighteen years or greater, unless the vendor or employee has a reasonable basis in fact to know the buyer is over the age of eighteen.
(e) Vendor-Assisted Sales.
(1) It is unlawful for any person, business or tobacco retailer to sell, permit to be sold, offer for sale or display for sale any tobacco product by means of a self-service display rack or shelf that allows self-service sales or any means other than vendor-assisted sales.
(2) All tobacco products shall be displayed and offered for sale exclusively by means of vendor/employee assistance, with tobacco products in a location which requires vendor or employee assistance to retrieve the tobacco product.
(f) Out-of-Package Sales. No person, business, tobacco retailer, or other establishment in the city shall sell or offer for sale cigarettes or other tobacco products not in the original packaging provided by the manufacturer and with all required health warnings. This section shall not apply to cigars dispensed from bulk packaging.
(g) Posting of Signs. Any person, business, tobacco retailer, or other establishment in the city which sells tobacco products shall post plainly visible signs at the point of purchase of tobacco products which comply with California State Business and Professions Code Section 22952 (STAKE Act). All letters of the sign shall be at least one-half inch high or larger.
(h) Severability. If any portion of this section or the application thereof to any person or circumstances is held invalid, the invalidity shall not affect the other provisions or applications of this section which can be given effect without the invalid provision or application, and to this end, the provisions of this section are severable.
(i) Enforcement.
(1) Enforcement of this section shall be the responsibility of the Woodland police chief or his or her designee, and the Woodland code enforcement officer. Further enforcement against a person shall not be undertaken without giving one warning to the offending business and/or offering an education session with a staff person designated by the director of the county health department.
(2) Notice of this section shall be given to all applicants for a business license or renewal thereof.
(3) Any citizen who wishes to register a complaint under this section may initiate enforcement by bringing the matter to the attention of the staff person designated by the director of the county health department, the Woodland police department or the Woodland code enforcement officer.
(j) Violations—Infractions.
(1) It is unlawful for any person who owns, manages, operates or otherwise controls the use of any premises subject to this regulation of this section to refuse to comply with any of its provisions.
(2) Any person, business, tobacco retailer, owner, manager or operator of any establishment subject to this section who violates any provision of this section shall be deemed guilty of an infraction punishable by:
(A) A fine not exceeding one hundred dollars for the first violation;
(B) A fine not exceeding two hundred dollars for a second violation within one year; and
(C) A fine not exceeding five hundred dollars for a third violation and for each additional violation of this section within one year.
(3) A person who violates any provision of this section shall be deemed guilty of a separate offense for each day, or portion thereof, during which the violation continues.
(k) Public Education. The Woodland police department and the Woodland community development department shall engage in a continuing program to explain and clarify the purpose and requirements of this section to citizens and businesses affected by it, and to guide owners, operators and managers in their compliance with it. Such program may include publication of a brochure for affected businesses and individuals explaining the provisions of this section. (Ord. No. 1329, § 1.)