ORDER-2017-178 : Tobacco Cessation and Prevention Program grant

Transcript (~22 min @ 1:16)

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▶ 1:02 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: We have a motion to close public participation by Alderman Infernus, seconded by Alderman Boisselle. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Public participation is closed. We have one item on our agenda this evening, Order No. 2017-178, the Tobacco Cessation and Prevention Program Grant.

▶ 1:21 Speaker 2: Motion to suspend the rules.

▶ 1:21 Speaker 1: Second.

▶ 1:22 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: We have a motion to suspend the rules by Alderman McAteer-Margolis. seconded by alderman inferna all in favor aye opposed we are under suspension of rules and we are joined by ruth clay this evening to speak to us about this item do you want to give us some

▶ 1:38 Speaker 1: background information to start sure thank you so um this is a state grant from the state health department and we it is a seven-year grant we are now into just starting the seventh year of the the seven-year grant so it is a regional grant that Melrose is hosting with I know you get tired of me hearing this but Walden Medford Wakefield Stoneham

▶ 2:12 Speaker 1: Redding Winchester so I I passed out just two pieces of information tonight just kind of give you a little bit of a update status report so there's I think

▶ 2:30 Speaker 1: this about there's three main initiatives that we do with this grant one is the enforcement of the underage sale of tobacco which we've been doing for 20 years I gave you an update the sheet that shows the sales to minors through our compliance checks from 2008 we have done one compliance check so far in 2017 there were no sales so we're doing we're doing well I just just for heck of it I included the cost of a pack of cigarettes in the spreadsheet because that's part of the data that we collect and you'll see bless you and we we have to buy the same brand cigarettes with the state's protocol so we are comparing apples to apples but in 2008 a pack of Newports was five dollars they're eleven

▶ 3:34 Speaker 1: dollars now that's like that was pretty dramatic but the good news is is we have very very few problems with sales to minors in our retail tobacco stores we also have far less retail tobacco stores we're not from well I I count from when I started so so from 20 years ago we literally have half the number of retail tobaccos supply retailers we have 12 right now we had no I'm trying like 22 24 so I think at our height so vast reduction we do a lot of work with smoke-free housing and the Melrose Housing Authority is smoke-free along with most of our other neighbors we started doing that actually before everybody else and then the other part that we do is regulation and policy so the other sheet I gave you with a table on it talks about the tobacco regulations and the different parts to it you know the original tobacco regulations just said you can't sell cigarettes to anybody under 18 and over time we have come a long ways from then I have listed all seven of the communities Melrose I listed first of course so all seven communities have raised the minimum sale to of tobacco to minors to 21 all seven of us there there is a bill in the state legislature to make that statewide it did not pass last year it's kind of at the end of the legislative session 60% of the state of Massachusetts population right now lives in a community where it is 21 and it keeps increasing so I would there's a decent possibility the legislature may may actually act on that this year including e-cigarettes and the definition of tobacco was something obviously we needed to update as new technology e-cigarettes and vaping came along so all of our communities have changed our definitions to include all forms minimum cigar pricing what we

▶ 6:06 Speaker 1: found was and I'm sure you noticed if you went into any of the convenience stores the game cigarellos two for 99 cents clearly marketed to youth so the new standard is a minimum price of two dollars and fifty cents for a cigar and five dollars for a multi-pack so in Melrose and actually all the communities except for Stoneham around here you'll see the same thing flavor restrictions

▶ 6:40 Speaker 1: They keep trying, they're very creative about this, so you can't sell cigarillos and the cigars that are bubblegum flavored and raspberry flavored, grape flavored, green, purple, but they keep changing their packaging in subtle ways to try to get around that. It's kind of like guacamole, you keep trying to stay one head. So all of our communities except for Malden and Stoneham have that, the drug paraphernalia ban we passed a long time ago, blunt wrap, roll your own bans, I don't know if you remember that was the big thing several years ago, the pharmacy ban. So all of those all of us have done. So in addition, Medford, Redding and Winchester have done permit caps and proximity bans.

▶ 7:41 Speaker 1: Now, Melrose updated, we updated our tobacco regulations kind of in the beginning of the first wave, and at the time, I really wasn't, to be honest with you, I wasn't really a proponent of the proximity ban or the cap because, I don't know, I just, I didn't feel like it was an issue for Melrose, free enterprise, all that.

▶ 8:07 Speaker 1: However, I'm kind of changing my mind a little bit on this, what's happening is that the vape stores, which do qualify as a retail tobacco store, are looking to find which communities

▶ 8:28 Speaker 1: do not have permit caps and are marketing and targeting those communities specifically. that in mind the board we're gonna bring this up in September with the Board of Health just as a discussion the board may may decide that a permit cap might be a good idea some communities do a permit cap on existing numbers so whatever you have now some say existing number plus one some say existing plus to it for those who have retail tobacco permits now it does not affect them nor does it affect if they go out of business or sell or whatever as long as whoever goes into that space applies within 60 days they can continue to have a permit so I'm just a little concerned about that part the proximity ban where we're in the process of having a map drawn out of 500 feet from all the

▶ 9:34 Speaker 1: schools but that might be tough I mean it would the existing places would be grandfathered in also so they wouldn't count it would only be if we allowed new permits in that they would not be allowed within 500 feet the one regulation that Melrose has that none of the other ones do is we did expand the definition of tobacco specifically to include chewing tobacco and specifically to include all parks within the city of Melrose not just the parks owned by the city and or the school department in Melrose incarnation does have a ballpark that isn't owned by the city or by the school department and therefore

▶ 10:17 Speaker 1: was modeled after the Fenway Park so Stoneham and Malden are both meeting

▶ 10:24 Speaker 1: actually tonight and tomorrow night boards of health and they are looking at the regulations that they don't have to update they haven't updated in a while and Melrose and Wakefield will discuss the permit cap and proximity ban in the fall Wakefield has four retail tobacco stores smoke shops and two vape stores I'm not sure Wakefield's interested in having any more and I'm a little concerned about that spillover to Melrose so I just wanted to use this opportunity to kind of let you know after seven years you know where we've

▶ 11:09 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: come from and where we're at thank you very much we have a few voting members in the queue for questions and then we'll open it up to non-voting members

▶ 11:17 Gail Infurna: Alderman Inferna thank you very much madam chairman thank you Ruth for coming out this evening earlier in your presentation you said something about the McCarthy house and I'm sorry I was concentrating on something else and I smoke-free oh it's smoke-free but do you go in there to check on that no no thank you very much for that clarification internally monitored and and um and at present we do not have any vape stores here in melrose no awesome awesome um and i do just want to take a moment to thank your board of health for all the work that they do on these regulations and especially maureen busby and her her um group that goes around and does the compliance checks she's everywhere right right you know you have a real uh hard working board of health and and with with maureen i think we do a great job on this stuff and thanks i certainly

▶ 12:09 Monica C. Medeiros: appreciate that so thank you very much thank you thank you thank you this is a state grant this is for FY 18 correct and I know the state's just finishing up their budget but hasn't fully finished up do we feel that this funding is

▶ 12:28 Speaker 1: completely safe has it already been awarded oh yeah this this year has been awarded that's why you're here accepting this year's funding the question will be the continuation now that we're end of the seven years we've already been told that an RFR request for proposals will be issued it will be competitive in the past it really hasn't been competitive and they are basically told us there's going to be some criteria that people have to meet before they would be eligible to apply for the grant the criteria includes having multiple communities so you can't just apply as one community just fine we're seven communities a certain threshold of population fine we meet that a minimum the minimum number of retail tobacco establishments which we don't quite meet among the seven of us the biggest concern is they are also tying it to what they've deemed communities of concern so they have they've they've

▶ 13:42 Speaker 1: listed communities that have high smoking rates and those are communities of concern, and 70% of your population has to include populations of community of concern, which we would not meet right now. Medford and Malden are our communities of concern right now. We would have to ... We're thinking about how we would deal with that. We would definitely have to change the coalition's membership to be able to meet that. And we intend to continue to apply. We don't feel like those of us who have done a good job all along should be penalized because we have done a good job.

▶ 14:33 Monica C. Medeiros: Okay. And then obviously this is a little bit off topic, but yet at the same time is relevant. is a tobacco control grant but we know that coming on board very soon we expect to have recreational marijuana in our language of our regulations I know this it's going to be probably a lot of discussion about whether or not some of the you know smoking applies to simply tobacco or if it applies to smoking all substances do we have for instance in the in the bans of all forms of tobacco in parks it does our regulations include smoking no it only includes tobacco

▶ 15:19 Monica C. Medeiros: products tobacco and nicotine products is that something that the Board of Health would look at outside of this grant possibly well I believe that the

▶ 15:26 Speaker 1: state law that is on the books or excuse me is about to be on the books or whatever already prohibits public smoking of marijuana can't do it I

▶ 15:41 Speaker 1: actually went to I was just at a national conference last week where I went to a number of sessions on marijuana put on by the city of Denver who has a lot of experience in it very interesting thank you thank you thank

▶ 15:59 Robert A. Boisselle: you for coming Ruth and this warm summer evening in your chart that you have here The permit cap line with the three communities, do they charge a fee for this permit or license?

▶ 16:15 Speaker 1: We all do.

▶ 16:17 Robert A. Boisselle: I mean, is it something different in a larger fee?

▶ 16:25 Speaker 1: A tobacco license is a tobacco license. It's about $200.

▶ 16:29 Robert A. Boisselle: Okay, but what makes this permit different from a license? Is it the number that's being offered?

▶ 16:36 Speaker 1: And in Board of Health jargon, we issue permits.

▶ 16:39 Speaker 3: Right, okay.

▶ 16:39 Speaker 1: In your jargon, you issue licenses.

▶ 16:41 Robert A. Boisselle: So they're both the same. They're both the same, okay, thank you, thank you.

▶ 16:44 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: Thank you. Any more questions from voting members of the committee?

▶ 16:49 Mary Beth McAteer-Margolis: Alderman . Just a quick one. You mentioned McCarthy House, Steel House, the city's senior housing. Does that include the private ones as well? Cochran House or it being smoke-free or Levi Gould I know the Cephalo House is

▶ 17:14 Mary Beth McAteer-Margolis: smoke-free that's that's federal I believe right that Cephalo I don't know

▶ 17:19 Speaker 1: the answer I'll find out but I don't know the answer just I know the Merrill's Housing Authority is right but those are owned by congregational retirement homes which is a private I'd have to find out great thank you so thank you

▶ 17:36 Peter D. Mortimer: Thank you very much, Chairman Lemmerman.

▶ 17:44 Peter D. Mortimer: I was curious about the amount of the disparity for one particular brand of cigarettes. That's the greatest disparity I see, although even from maybe a more top brand, it's more than double the price, and then for Newports, it's 70% more.

▶ 18:01 Speaker 1: Look at the first column, the first column is the year, that was 2008. All right. And then the last ones are 2016, eight years later, so it's showing the price over time.

▶ 18:13 Peter D. Mortimer: Okay, so all right, I see, so it's how much it's increased. And what is the greatest disparity that we have presently? What do you mean? Between the cheapest for a pack of cigarettes and Melrose and the most expensive, if you happen to know. It's about $5. Yeah, $5 difference?

▶ 18:36 Speaker 1: Maybe $4.

▶ 18:36 Speaker 3: And-

▶ 18:38 Speaker 1: The state has a minimum price.

▶ 18:39 Peter D. Mortimer: Right, they have a minimum price, but- Per brand. And would you have any idea why some places, I mean, we just got this chart just now. You just handed this out to us, and so I'm looking it over as we're studying this. but to what would you attribute the difference? Is it lack of mobility of the people who might patronize the stores? Some stores, what concerns me is that people who are addicted to cigarettes and might be older and less mobile are being gouged, for lack of a better word, on some of the prices of these cigarettes. If one store sells it for.

▶ 19:20 Speaker 1: They all sell for about the same. They're not exactly the same, but they're about the same. They all try to be as cheap as possible, not as more expensive as possible.

▶ 19:28 Peter D. Mortimer: Did you just say there was a $4 disparity? By brand. By brand, okay.

▶ 19:33 Speaker 1: So if you buy a generic brand versus Marlboros.

▶ 19:36 Peter D. Mortimer: All right, and how about within the same brand? Would you think there's not such a great disparity?

▶ 19:43 Speaker 1: They're all trying to sell them as cheaply as possible.

▶ 19:46 Speaker 3: Of course.

▶ 19:47 Speaker 1: Not as expensive as possible.

▶ 19:47 Peter D. Mortimer: Right. I know from people I've talked to who travel in those circles right now because the price has gone up so much, some of these differences from $5 in 2008 to $11 now. What has come back into practice among the criminal element in Massachusetts and other of New England states, New York, is running cigarettes up from South Carolina.

▶ 20:22 Speaker 1: When we do our inspections, we do check for the Department of Revenue stamp. Right. And we have found illegal cigarettes that we report to the Department of Revenue.

▶ 20:31 Peter D. Mortimer: So you have found that some of these cigarettes that are being smuggled up from South Carolina are making their way to Melrose?

▶ 20:38 Speaker 1: I don't know if they're smuggled and I don't know where they're from, but sometimes we do find cigarettes that don't have DOR stamps on them.

▶ 20:45 Peter D. Mortimer: So they lack the Massachusetts tax stamp, and it would be a reasonable conclusion to believe they've been smuggled in from out of state then.

▶ 20:53 Speaker 1: I don't know where they come from.

▶ 20:54 Peter D. Mortimer: All right, because that's something we need to look at, because-

▶ 21:04 Speaker 1: It's not a very, it's a very small issue, and I think in the past 20 years we've seen it once, maybe twice.

▶ 21:07 Speaker 3: Right, but it is-

▶ 21:08 Speaker 1: In all my communities, not just Mellor's, I mean all together, it's just very rare to see that.

▶ 21:13 Peter D. Mortimer: With this big increase in the prices and the taxes, it's starting to proliferate. It's starting to come up. And then what the problem with that is, is that then some of the smugglers will get them, and they'll end up being sold out of people's basements and end up in the hands of children, unfortunately, or people under 18, people under 21.

▶ 21:36 Speaker 1: The Department of Revenue has a whole group of people that that's what they do.

▶ 21:39 Peter D. Mortimer: Enforcement squad. Yeah. just some food for thought something we might want to keep our eye on and in your presentation you mentioned that roll your own is prohibited roll your own cigarettes machines okay but roll your own buying a pouch of tobacco you can do you can still do that in Melrose good just for the reason that the the The factory made cigarettes are said to, you know, all smoking is bad, I'm sure. But they say that the factory made ones have a lot of unhealthy additives and a lot of people have gone to the roll your own for the sake that one, it's cheaper.

▶ 22:25 Speaker 1: The additives are also in the tobacco that's already grown. Yeah. Pesticides that are systemic are already in the tobacco. To be honest with you, cigarettes aren't really the issue. right now vaping and e-cigarettes is far far more prevalent all right and uh by adults and yes

▶ 22:43 Peter D. Mortimer: so the vaping is really picking up but the roll your own yeah that's that's not prohibited good that's all i have madam chairman thank you very much any further questions or comments

▶ 22:56 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: motion to recommend second the motion to recommend from alderman inferno seconded by alderman Alderman McAteer-Margolis, all in favor?

▶ 23:00 Speaker 2: Aye.

▶ 23:01 Speaker 4: Any opposed?

▶ 23:04 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: Motion will be recommended for passage to the full board meeting,

▶ 23:06 Speaker 4: which takes place this evening.

▶ 23:10 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: And that is the end of our motion.

▶ 23:11 Speaker 3: Motion to adjourn.

▶ 23:12 Jennifer L. Lemmerman: Motion to adjourn by Alderman Boisselle, seconded by Alderman Inferna, all in favor? Aye. Any opposed? This committee is adjourned.