The San Francisco Ballot Simplification Committee has the important task of writing a plain English summary of what ballot measures do so voters don’t need to be lawyers to figure out what they are voting for.
In their summary of the Juul initiative, they ducked their responsibility when they did not clearly state whether or not the Juul initiative would repeal San Francisco’s ban on the sale of flavored e-cigarettes (as part of its overall ban on the sale of flavored tobacco products). Rather than accepting former City Attorney Louise Rennie and the health advocates reading of the initiative (and mine) that the initiative would repeal the flavor ban (Proposition E, endorsed by 68% of voters) or siding with Juul that the Juul initiative did not repeal the flavor ban, the Committee said it “may” overturn the ban.
Even if one swallows this waffling, the Committee could have made it clear that a “no” vote would unequivocally keep flavored e-cigs out of San Franciso (current law).
So much for Ballot Simplification.
You can read the approved summary and my comments and what changes should be made to give voters a clear view of what they are voting on here.
Juul seems pretty unhappy that independent legal experts are decoding the obscure legal language in Section 19N.5-6(a) of the Juul initiative that would replace all existing e-cig regulations in San Francisco with rules written by Juul, including exempting e-cigarettes from the ban on the sale of candy-flavored e-cigarettes that voters overwhelmingly supported when they passed Proposition E (with 68% voting for the ban) in June 2018.
As I have pointed out before, if all Juul wanted to do was overturn San Francisco’s law saying that it and other e-cig companies could not sell their products until they were granted an FDA authorization to sell them, Juul could have written a much simpler initiative that just nullified that law.
Dharma Bhatta, Eric Crosbie, Stella Bialous and I just published “Tobacco control in Nepal during a time of government turmoil (1960-2006)” in Tobacco Control. This paper describes early tobacco control efforts in Nepal and shows how, even in exceptionally difficult political circumstances, it is possible to make progress on tobacco control. The Nepalese advocates also made creative use of litigation to advance their efforts.
What is already known on this subject
► The tobacco industry influences tobacco control policy in low-income and middle-income countries (LMICs) by taking advantage of low state capacity, unstable governments and corruption.
► Most litigation on tobacco control in LMICs has been initiated by the tobacco companies to block regulation.
What this paper adds
►In Nepal, political instability or conflict, direct investment on tobacco business by royal family members and the dictatorship had significant negative effects on tobacco control.
►Involvement in international activities, such as World No Tobacco Day, created opportunities for Nepalese tobacco control advocates to press government for change.
Netflix, the smokiest of the US streaming services, is going to develop more original programs around the world.
Having already bankrolled local programming in Germany, France and the UK, Netflix will now target other international territories including the Netherlands, Argentina and Colombia, Scandinavia, Central and Eastern Europe, the Middle East and Africa, Screen Daily reports.
After being grilled by Congressman Elijah Cummings (5 min, worth watching) on why they were promoting an initiative to overturn e-cigarette regulation in San Francisco, including the flavor ban upheld by 68% of SF voters, Juul is intensifying its PR campaign to promote the myth that its initiative would leave the flavor ban intact. On Friday July 26, the day after the hearing, a lawyer for Juul’s campaign wrote the City Attorney and put out a press release (reproduced below) claiming that the Jull initiative did not override the flavor ban for e-cigare